Can't Steal Something That's Been Given To You
by ThievesOverBullies
Summary: A/U Fate Crosses a very young Regina Mills.
1. Chapter 1

_**A/N-I want to thank a special friend Bekki for being an amazing beta, a great ear. Thanks so much boo! Hope you enjoy this one.**_

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Today was a very special day for Regina Mills, today she was celebrating her tenth birthday, she was on vacation with her parents in England. And today they were going to Hamley's toy store, her father Henry Mills had promised to take her. Regina couldn't wait to visit the toy store, she wanted to see the different dolls they had. She had on her new dress she had gotten this morning, upon waking up. It was a red polka dotted A-line sleeveless dress.

Cora Mills on the other hand saw it as a waste of time.

"Really, we're going to spend the morning at a mere toy store? Why we could be seeing the best stores in London," Cora complained. She would rather be in numerous stores, doing her own sort of shopping and not in a toy store. Henry Mills was a successful banker, and they had always led an entertaining life.

"Cora, it's her birthday," Henry said as they headed into the store, Henry turned and crunched down to his daughter's level, "and today she gets this to spend on anything she wishes in the store." He gave her a coin, worth twenty dollars.

"Oh, thank you, Daddy. Thank you!" Regina cried out as she hugged her father.

"You're welcome, sweetheart," Henry said as he hugged his little girl back. "And I also have this for you." He pulled out a red hair bow, and proceeded to put it in her hair.

"There," Henry remarked, "now you look like my little princess." He turned her around to look in a mirror behind her.

"It's so pretty, Daddy," Regina said as she looked at how beautiful the red ribbon was against her dark hair.

"Not as pretty as you," Henry said as he patted her shoulders. "Now run along and find you something to spend your coin on."

Regina smiled up at her father as she headed to where the dolls were located in the store.

"Really, Henry, you spoil her too much," Cora admonished him.

"She's my little girl, it's my job to spoil her," Henry said as the two adults started to walk around the store.

Regina was looking at several dolls, going back and forth between two of them, not being able to decide on which one she would pick over the other. She had finally decided on the doll with the red ribbon in her hair. She smiled as she went to reach for it, but in doing so she saw something outside the department store window.

A little boy, a little boy that from the looks of him was very poor. She watched as he tried to draw people's pictures for them for money. Most people just walked by him, some of them very rich from their clothes and the several bags they were carrying with them.

Regina saw his sad face and as she watched his shoulders seem to slump even more, Regina looked down at the coin her father had given her and knew what she wanted to do. She made her decision and looked around for her parents, when she saw them talking to another two adults across the store, she made a beeline for the front entrance.

She walked down the sidewalk, and slowly approached the little boy. "Hello?" she said as she was only a few feet from him.

The little boy turned around slowly, "Hello." his voice was low, but he had an English accent that much she could tell. She liked how other people could speak with another type of accent to their voices.

"Do you, do you want me to draw your picture?" he asked as he smiled at her.

"No, today is my birthday," she informed him.

"Oh. Well, Happy Birthday," he told her.

"Thank you," she said as she held out her hand with the coin her father had given her. "And I want you to have this."

"But, why?" he asked, clearly confused on why the little girl was just going to give him money.

"Because, my father gave it to me and told me to spend it however I wished," she told him.

"But didn't you come out of the toy store?" he asked.

"Yes," she answered.

"Don't you want to spend it on something in there instead?" he asked.

"No, I want you to have it," she said as he looked at her and slowly took the gold coin from her.

"If I take it, my mom might think I stole it," he said.

"You can't steal something, that's been given to you," Regina said with a smile.

"Thank you," he whispered. "I can still do a quick drawing of you if you wish."

Regina smiled and was about to answer him, when she heard her name being called out loud, "Regina! Regina where are you?"

"It's mother! I have to go," she said as she turned and ran back into the store before her mother found her outside the store.

"Wait! I don't even know your name!" the little boy called out from behind her, but it was too late she was already back in the store. He looked down on the sidewalk and saw that her hair ribbon had come out as she had left him. He picked it up, and put it inside his worn out coat.

Once back inside the store, Regina carefully made her way back to the doll aisle. She had just picked up a doll as her parents came around the corner.

"Regina! There you are. Where have you been?" Cora asked as she stopped right in front of her.

"I was looking at the paints over there, and came back to the dolls," Regina answered. She hoped her mother could not tell that she wasn't telling the truth.

"Is that so?" Cora asked as she stared down at her daughter, as she raised her eyebrows with a look of disbelief.

"Now there is my little girl," Henry said as he walked up and picked up Regina in his arms, he settled her on his hip. "So did you find something to spend your money on?"

"I'm sorry, Daddy, but I lost the coin you gave me," Regina answered as she lowered her head. She hated lying to her Daddy, more than anything. She hoped he would never find out, and be disappointed in her for doing so.

"That's what happens when you spoil a child, Henry," Cora stated flatly.

"Nothing wrong with losing something," Henry stated, as he lifted his daughter's chin up to tell her the rest of his statement, "just remember that sometimes we loose things, but sometimes we are meant to find them again. Always remember that, Regina."

"I will, Daddy," Regina said, as she hugged her father.

"That's my girl," Henry said, "now how about we go get some ice cream."

"Thank you, Daddy," Regina said as he turned and started walking towards an ice cream shop down the street.

"Regina, where is your hair ribbon?" Cora asked.

Regina put a hand to her hair and didn't feel it, "It must have fallen off somewhere."

"You need to be more careful about your things, Regina. Or else you'll end up loosing everything," Cora chided her daughter. Regina lowered her head, and her bottom lip came out in a small pout.

"It's okay, Regina," Henry said as Regina looked up at him, "As long as you have love in your heart, you'll always have everything."

"You keep doing this and she's going to be even more spoiled," Cora stated.

"It's her birthday, and she's entitled to be spoiled for her birthday, Cora," Henry said as he walked out of the toy shop.

"Seems like it's her birthday then, every day," Cora said.

"Ignore, your mother, Regina," Henry whispered as Regina buried her head into the crook of her father's neck. As he walked, Regina turned her head to look over her father's shoulders, to see if she could see the little boy anymore. But now there was no sign of him, she hoped that wherever he was, that he was safe and not hungry tonight.

As the years passed, things changed dramatically for the Mills family. They had moved to England after a few years, settling in Kennington, which was a district in London, England, south of the River Thames. It is mainly within the London Borough of Lambeth, running along the boundary with the London Borough of Southwark a boundary which can be discerned from the early medieval period between the Lambeth and St George's parishes of those boroughs respectively.

Henry Mills had a few bad years, which was made worse when he had several bad investments, which resulted in them loosing lots of money. Because of the added stress, Henry Mills suffered a heart attack and after several weeks in the ICU, his heart gave out.

Regina Mills was heartbroken, her daddy had always been her hero. She had been inconsolable when he had passed away. She loved her mother, she did, but Cora Mills had made it hard to love her as she always wanted to be in complete control of everything in her life, her daughter included. Now, there was just her mother and herself. They had been forced to sell the house and had moved into Cora's mother old house, it was an old farmhouse but it was all that they could afford.

Regina was working as a child care worker at a local children's orphanage, when she wasn't taking night classes at a local university. She was studying to be a teacher. She loved being around children, and they seemed to love being around her. Especially this one little boy, who had been given up for adoption on the day of his birth. Often, when on her breaks throughout the day, she would go to the nursery and sit in a rocking chair and hold him. He would just look up at her and eventually his eyes would grow heavy and he would drift off to sleep.

They hadn't started off that way, when he had first come to the orphanage he had cried when she had held him. She had wanted him to like her so much, and after she made a deal with him, that she would rock him every day that she was here if he would stop crying with her. He seemed to accept the deal and started to come around to her, now falling asleep in her arms every day she worked.

"Regina!" Cora yelled from the doorway of the nursery.

"Shh!" Regina whispered as she stood up from the rocking chair and put the little boy back into his crib. She then brought her mother outside into the hallway, and carefully closed the door behind her.

"You almost woke him up," Regina said.

"Oh who cares," Cora said as she grabbed her daughter's forearms.

"What do you want, mother?" Regina asked.

"Oh, Regina. I have the most wonderful news," Cora said. "I was in town today and ran into an old friend of your father and I. We quickly caught up and he's coming by for dinner tonight."

"That's wonderful, mother. I hope you have a great time," Regina said as she walked around her mother and started walking down the hallway.

"I want you there at five, Regina," Cora said.

"I'm working tonight, mother," Regina said.

"You can skip working tonight," Cora reassured her.

"What is so important about tonight? Who is this person?" Regina asked.

"Oh Regina, he's the man who is the answer to our prayers," Cora answered.

Regina looked skeptically at her mother, and before Regina could question her further, her mother continued.

"His name is Leopold Blanchard," she said.


	2. Chapter 2

(Thanks to Regal Bekki for beta reading this. Appreciate it so much. And to those who read, review, etc.)

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Later that night, as Cora had said, Leopold Blanchard came to dinner, and the night after that and the night after that, Regina could tell he was interested in her, but the man was old enough to be her father.

Pretty soon, he was sending her flowers, and coming to her work to take her out for lunch or dinner. She went a few times, out of trying to be nice. But the man was giving her the creeps. One night when he tried to kiss her, she moved away from him.

"Must you be like that?" Leopold asked.

"I'm sorry, but I think you have assumptions about me," Regina informed him.

"No assumptions, my dear," Leopold said as he neared her.

"What do you mean?" Regina asked.

"I suggest you go home and speak to your mother about your future, our future," Leopold said.

Regina went home that night, and immediately went to her mother's room.

"What does Leopold mean when he spoke about my future? What does he have to do with my future, mother?" Regina asked.

"Regina, sit down," Cora asked her as they sat on her bed.

"Now, tell me, mother," Regina demanded of her.

"Regina, I've arranged for your future to be very grand indeed," Cora said.

"How?" Regina asked.

"My dear, Leopold is a widow and needs a mother for his daughter," Cora informed her.

Regina knew then what her mother had planned for her, for her future. "No."

"Regina, he will make sure our futures are set," Cora said.

"Your future, mine will be destroyed," Regina said.

Every since she was a little girl, her father had always been her hero. She had wanted someone like him, a confidants, someone with whom to share her dreams of true love and a happily ever after. Regina wished for that, but she also wished for more, she wished for magic. She had spent hours on end, dreaming about meeting someone, someone who would love her.

"Regina?"

Regina blinked, realizing her mother must have continued to be speaking. "I'm not going to marry someone that I don't love, mother."

Her mother frowned, "You've always had too much of a romantic heart and not see the bigger picture. Why, Romeo and Juliet was always your favorite story. Honestly Regina, sacrificing yourself for the sake of love is not romantic, Regina. Love is weakness, Regina."

"I'm not going to whore myself for you," Regina defied her mother.

"You will marry him or we will loose everything," Cora said as she took hold of her daughter's forearms.

"I can quit going to school and try to find another job," Regina offered, as she thought of how her mother had never worked, never helped with their bills.

"I'm afraid, that is not going to be enough, by next month, we'll be kicked out of this house," Cora explained as Regina stood up and walked over to the window to look outside.

"Next month? That's it?" Regina asked, feeling the darkness start to surround her.

"But look on the bright side, you'll be set up for life," Cora said as she came up behind her.

"I don't want to marry him," Regina said as she turned around to face her, her face was defeated.

"Nonsense, you'll realize I'm right, and thank me one day," Cora said as Regina closed her eyes and knew her future was set. She would sacrifice herself for her mother and herself.

A month later, it was her wedding day, and she was standing out on the balcony looking out over the lush grounds of the castle where she was to marry Leopold Blanchard. Her mother had been telling her how happy she was, Regina was glad one of them would be.

Leopold had been estatic over her accepting his proposal, if you could call it that. He had come over the following night, and asked her if she had spoken with her mother yet. Regina informed him that she had, and she would marry him. Cora had left them alone in the living room while Henry had slipped his ring on her finger, and kissed her. His kiss made her feel ill inside, made her feel cold.

She had asked for some time alone, and she felt this sinking feeling inside her like the cratering of her soul. She was nervous. She had endured Leopold touching her, kissing her lips, she had pretended she was someplace else, someone else.

The enormity of what she'd promised her mother she would do, pledging her life to Leopold, made her skin feel cold in a way that had nothing to do with ice and frost. Her body was screaming at her to flee. She left the balcony, going down the stairs to a decorative harden with its ghostly cover of snow. Her white tulle skirts trailed lightly behind her, scattering powdery flakes that sparkled like diamonds.

The night was dark and clear. Looking up, she studied the stars above her.

She closed her eyes to calm herself, "Please," she prayed softly, "please let me find some happiness."

"So," a voice said from behind her, "you are the bride."

Regina whirled to face him, her skirts sweeping the snow on the floor of the balcony.

A man stood there, in front of three SUV's on the edge of the graveled courtyard. His hair was dark blonde from what she could tell. He had an English accent.

Regina trembled as if she'd seen a ghost. She whispered, "Who are you?"

Without a word, he started walking towards her.

Something about his hostile stare and the shadows of his face frightened her. Regina realized suddenly how far she'd ventured from the castle, she knew the ballroom was full of noise, with a chamber string orchestra and hundreds of guests. Would anyone hear her if she screamed?

Then she reasoned, she was at her wedding, there was no need to worry. Right?

Ignoring the instincts that told her to turn and run, Regina folded her arms over her white, corseted bodice. Lifting her chin, she waited for his answer.

The stranger stopped directly in front of her, his body inches away from hers. He was so muscular and broad shouldered he had to be almost twice her weight. He was so tall that the top of her head barely reached his shoulder.

His blue eyes gleamed down at her. "Are you alone out here, little one?"

A chill crept across the skin of her arms, bare beneath the white lace sleeves. She shook her head. "There are hundreds of people inside the ballroom."

His sensual lips curved upward.

"Ah, but you're not in the ballroom. You're alone. And do you not know," he said softly, "how cold a winter night can be?"

Cold. A shiver went through her. No matter how high the thermostat was set in the aging castle or how many sweaters she'd worn, no matter how many times Leopold had assured her that she was perfect, that she could be nothing but perfect, she'd never once felt warm in the his presence. "I'm not afraid of a little snow."

"Such bravery," his said, as his blue eyes traced over her body, burning her wherever they touched. "And yet you know why I've come."

"Yes, of course," she said, bewildered.

"But you do not run away?" he asked.

She blinked, even as her feet inched backward of their own violation, and asked, "Why would I run? I'm sure you must have traveled a long distance for our wedding. I'm sure Leopold will be so happy to see you."

The man barked a sudden laugh, "Is that some sort of joke?"

Regina stopped, "Aren't you one of his friends?"

The man drew closer to her.

"No, he said. "I am not a friend."

His body towered over hers without touching her, leaving her in shadow. She felt his physical strength like a threat. And suddenly she knew that her instincts had been right all along.

She needed to get out of here, now.

"Excuse me," she choked out, stumbling back. "My fiancee is waiting for me. The guests-"

The man's hand flew out to grab her upper arm over her translucent lace sleeve, gripping her tight, preventing her escape. His blue eyes stared down at her with deep, fathomless rage as he slowly looked from her breasts, which were pushed up by the tight bodice, to the enormous diamond ring sparkling on her left hand.

Finally his eyes met hers, and with a brutal jerk, he pulled her so close to him that her wide tulle skirts whirled around his muscular legs.

"I have no idea why you're being so hostile towards me," Regina cried out.

"You are a liar, just as I knew you'd be," he hissed in her ear. "What I did not realize was that you would also be so beautiful."

"You've made...you've made some kind of mistake." She licked her dry lip. His blue eyes fell to her mouth, tracing the movement of her tongue.

Her lips burned beneath his gaze, causing a scorching trail of fire to spread down her body, sizzling from her lips to her earlobes. To her breasts. To her core, coiling low in her belly.

"No mistake," he said roughly, his grip tightening on her shoulders. "Now you will pay."

"You're drunk, or crazy!" she cried out.

Kicking his shins, she wrenched away from his grasp. Desperately, she ran toward the bright castle. She ran for safety.

But the stranger caught up with her. She felt his hands roughly grab her and she screamed.

With a savage growl, he seized her, lifting her up in his arms, holding her tightly against his chest as if she weighed nothing at all. Her white, translucent veil flew behind them as he carried her across the snowy garden.

"What are you doing? Stop this!" she cried, kicking and struggling in his arms. "Let me go! Help!"

But no help came. No one could hear her screams inside the castle, over the noise of the orchestra. Holding her, the man grimly waded through the snow toward the three black SUV's parked in the dark courtyard. She heard the three engines start. She screamed and twisted against him, fighting with all her strength, but her abductor barely seemed to notice.

And why should he? Her strength was nothing compared to his, at least not physical. He pushed her inside the back door of the last SUV, then slid in beside her, closing the door behind them.

"Go," he told the driver.

The driver stomped on the gas, scattering socks and gravel as the back tires slid on a patch of ice. The other two cars roared ahead of them, as they sped into the dark forest mountains of the countryside.

The stranger released Regina's wrist, glowering down at her. What had she done to deserve such a look from him?

Rubbing her wrist, she turned to look through the back window in time to see the castle disappear behind her. Everything that was rational and civilized was...gone.

With a choked gasp, Regina looked at the mad man beside her, the stranger who'd just stolen her away from her wedding. "You kidnapped me," she whispered, "from my own wedding."

The man stared back at her with dead eyes. His jaw clenched.

She moved away from him to the edge of her seat, her body pressing against the far door, her white tulle skirts spread all around her. "What do you want with me? Why have you taken me?"

The man's lips curved into a sinister smile as he leaned against the seat. His eyes bored into her soul with malice and dislike.

Then he reached for her. He reached for her tiara and veil and ripped it from her hair.

Her eyes flew open and she saw his window rolling down as he gripped her diamond tiara and the white gauzy veil in one hand.

"What are you doing?" she gasped.

He didn't reply. He just flung the tiara and veil out onto the road. The window slid noiselessly back up.

Regina stared out the back window.

Regina turned back, shaking, "How dare you?"

"It was a fake," the man replied coldly.

"It's a priceless heirloom. It belonged to my fiancee's family for generations-"

"Fake," he cut her off. He turned away, adding in a low voice, "As fake as this wedding was to be."

"What?" she whispered.

"You hear me."

"You're mad."

For a moment she thought he wouldn't answer that, either. Then his jaw twitched. "You know your marriage would have been fake. Just as you know who I am."

"I don't!"

"My name is Robin Locksley," he bit out, watching her.

 _Robin Locksley._

She'd heard Leopold shouting out the name in a rage to his assistants and bodyguards. Now his apparent enemy had kidnapped her.

 _Robin Locksley._

Regina suddenly couldn't breathe. That name meant this wasn't a mistake. This wasn't a dream. She'd been kidnapped by her would be husband's enemy. Like a thief stealing something that didn't belong to him.

"What are you going to do with me?" she whispered.

Robin gave her a chilling smile, "Nothing. Absolutely nothing."

She didn't believe him for an instant. She had to get out of here, before he tossed her out the window next! She grabbed at her door handle, but it was locked.

Grimly, he shackled her wrists with his hands, pushing her back against the seat, his body crushing hers. "You can't escape."

"Someone help me!" she screamed.

"No help is coming for you, Regina Mills." He looked down at her with loathing in his blue eyes. "You are...mine."


	3. Chapter 3

**(A/N-Special thanks to Regal Bekki for beta reading this. Also those who read, review, and follow.)**

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 _He hadn't expected her to be so beautiful._

As the SUV flew down the road through the snowy night, Robin Locksley stared down at the petite brunette beneath him, her slender wrists shackled in his hands. The instant she'd tried to escape, he'd instinctively covered her with his body, pressing her into the soft leather of the backseat.

Robin could hear the soft pleading pants of her breath, smell the scent of fresh linen and tea roses that clung to her skin. Her every gasp lifted her full breasts higher above the tightly corseted satin bodice, until he thought the fabric could not contain her for much longer.

His body tightened, and he forced himself to look away.

He wasn't supposed to want Regina Mills. Despise her, yes. Use her? Certainly.

So how to explain this sudden rush of desire?

He told himself that he had no interest in learning about her character, her so called soul. What would be the purpose of such an exercise? He'd be done with her by morning.

It wasn't as if his mistresses were innocent virgins. They could take care of themselves. They had agendas of their own, usually lusting for his body, his money, his power or all three. Anyone could be bought, he knew. Everyone had a price.

 _What was hers?_

But wanting this particular woman was a new low, even for him. While she might be beautiful, she belonged to Leopold Blanchard. He could understand why Blanchard had risked so much to want her for his wife.

 _Just one small problem there._

She looked up at him, still panting, her eyes flashing. Her dark hair had tumbled loose from the elegant smooth chignon when he'd ripped the tiara off her head. Long dark tendrils now fell against her face, against skin like cream. Her dark eyes even though they were dark, had so much light in them. Her lips were full and red, and parted, her face flushed with passion and fury.

She looked, Robin thought, like a woman who'd just made love in the heat of explosive fire.

She must be luring him deliberately, he thought, teasing him like a seductress. Turning her feminine charms on him in hopes of evading punishment, in hope of winning his heart to her side.

Too bad for her that he had no heart.

His men had been watching Auchen Castle for days, since Robin had first heard about this so called wedding. Robin had planned to kidnap Blanchard, and make him reveal Marian's location by force. But Blanchard was too cagey for that. He'd never come out of that castle alone.

Robin couldn't wait any longer. After a year, he was no longer sure of Marian's condition. She could be dying. In desperation, he had nearly stormed into the castle with all his men, guns blazing, even knowing it could only end in disaster.

Then he'd seen the man's bride to be leaving the castle in the dark, moonlit garden. When Robin saw her illuminated by the eerie light of the moon, he'd known it for the miracle that it was. And he'd seized the opportunity.

Robin knew all about Regina Mills, how she had managed to get herself engaged to the wealthier older man. Obviously a gold digger. Rather than escape any poverty through hard work, she had obviously had settled for marrying Blanchard.

That was all Robin needed to know. He felt no pity. He felt nothing for her except scorn and cold anger.

Except that was no longer true. He now also felt lust.

Holding her down in the backseat of his SUV, as he gripped her wrists in his hands and heard the pant of her breath, he hated her. And he desired her.

"You won't get away with this," Regina gasped at him.

"No?" He had to force himself to stay focused only on her eyes and not on her breasts, which were rising and falling rapidly with every breath. He gritted his teeth, focusing his gaze only on her face by an act of pure will.

"Leopold will-"

"He won't be your husband."

"What...what have you done?" she asked, with growing shock and horror.

"You heard me," Robin said grimly.

"Did you, did you kill him?" Regina asked.

He'd been tempted to do just that, as recently as an hour ago, but killing Blanchard, while personally satisfying, would have had negative repercussions. Robin could hardly take care of Belle from a jail cell.

"Take me back," Regina whispered. "And I promise I'll never tell anyone what you did. I promise!"

" _You promise?"_ Robin said scornfully. "Your promise is worthless."

"How can you say that? You don't even know me," Regina said.

"I know enough," he replied harshly. "And now you and your lover will both pay."

She then began to struggle wildly, kicking at him with her high heeled shoes. Her wide skirts flew over the backseat in waves of white lace and tulle. The driver in the front seat spun off the road as her knee hit the back of the seat. She kicked the window so hard that Robin had to grab her ankle to keep her from breaking the glass.

"Stop!" he commanded, using his body to compel her to obey him. But to his amazement, though she was so much smaller, even though she had no chance of winning, she continued to fight.

"You bastard! You coward!" she panted. "You'll never get away with this!"

All of her struggling only increased his desire for her. As she writhed beneath him, and he saw the spark of furious challenge in her eyes, the intensity of his need hit him like a wave. But why did she fight him, when it had to be clear that she had no chance of winning, that she'd already lost?

"Be still!" he demanded.

She stopped struggling, staring at him with dark rage, glaring her hatred and defiance. But it sparked a response in him that was even worse than lust. It was the last thing he wanted to feel for her.

A grudging respect.

As the convey slowed down, he abruptly released her. Ahead in the moonlight, his largest jet was waiting for them on a deserted landing strip. Amid the whirl of softly shimmering snowflakes lifted from the ground by the wind, the runway had been swept clear of snow and looked like a black river, as dark as the sky above.

When Regina saw the jet, her whole body sagged with sudden despair. The SUV stopped, and she turned to him. A single tear streamed down her cheek.

"Don't do this," she whispered to him. "Please whatever quarrel you have with Leopold, don't force me on that plane. Please, let me go back."

"Let me go back to my wedding," she continued tearfully.

Robin's lips curled. "I told you. You'll have no husband."

She gasped, looking terrified.

He stared back at her as the driver opened his door. She knew perfectly well what he meant. It was an act. It had to be!

"I'm begging you," she whimpered, her dark eyes luminous with the light of unshed tears. Her future, her family's future depended on her marrying Leopold.

Roughly, he grabbed her arm. "The reason you'll have no husband" he bit out, "is because Leopold Blanchard already has a wife."

Regina went numb with shock. As Robin pulled her from the UV, leading her across the dark tarmac to the waiting plane, she did no resist.

"But he can't have a wife," she said, numbly, looking up at him with bewildered confusion. "I'm going to be his wife!"

"The wedding would have been faked," he said coldly. "The vows as well. The minister would have been faked. And most of all, Miss Mills," he glanced down at her with glittering blue eyes as they reached the bottom of the steps, "you are fake."

Regina stomped on his foot with her high heel, forcing him to instantly release her as she ran away, but she only went a few steps as the driver, a big burly man picked her up and carried her, literally kicking and screaming back to Robin.

"Thank you, John," Robin said as John put her down, Robin marched her up the stairs into the cabin of the plane, where they were greeted by two flight attendants, the captain and copilot. Bodyguards poured in behind them before they disappeared into the back of the jet.

The captain gave Robin a respectful nod. "We are ready for takeoff at your order, sir."

One of the flight attendants took Robin's coat, while the other one greeted him with a silver tray holding drinks. Regina heard the cabin door close behind her with a loud bang.

"Thank you." Taking a flute of champagne from the tray, Robin sat down on a white leather seat in the front cabin of the jet. He turned carelessly back to Regina. "Champagne, Miss Mills? No?"

When Regina just stared at him in shock without replying, Robin gave a small, private smirk and nodded at the captain, "You may proceed."

The captain and copilot disappeared to the front of the cabin to complete their takeoff preparations, and the flight attendants left for the back of the plane. Alone with Regina in the front cabin, Robin stretched out his arm on the back of the white leather seat. As he took a sip of his champagne, he seemed relaxed. Contented.

Regina stared at the crystal flute in the large, roughened hand. Just an hour ago, she herself had been sipping champagne in the dressing room getting ready for her wedding.

 _Was it possible t had all been a lie?_

"You have to be lying about Leopold," Regina choked out. "He wouldn't have done this awful thing you're accusing him of."

"You might be surprised of the harm that Leopold Blanchard is capable of," Robin said.

"Leopold wouldn't have pursued me if he were already married," Regina said.

"He wouldn't?" Robin asked with raised eyebrows.

"No. He wouldn't."

"I can see marriage means a great deal to you." He gave a hard look at the big diamond on her left hand. "So much that you didn't mind speaking a few false vows in order to get your hands on that."

He thought she cared about this huge diamond ring? She clasped her hands together tightly. Regina didn't care about jewelry, only what it symbolized. "You think I was going to marry him for his money?"

"It would have done you no good if you had," Robin said.

Rising to his feet, her captor crossed two steps to her. His eyes were almost piercing her being. He towered over her and she had to force herself not to cower, but to stand straight and tall, to stand her ground against him.

"Leopold has no money of his own. His money comes from his wife's inheritance, from her wealthy mother." His lips twisted as he scornfully touched the exquisite lace of her sleeve. "That's her money you're wearing on your back right now."

"I don't believe you," Regina said.

"Keep on telling yourself that, milady."

"If any of this is true, if he was as bad as you say, why wouldn't his wife just divorce him?"

Robin looked away, his jaw clenching. "She can't."

"Why?"

Narrowing his eyes, he looked at her. "They were in an accident. She's in a coma. Not that you would care."

His tone made it clear he thought Regina was a greedy, heartless brat. She, who'd worked two jobs at one point to help pay for her schooling, to help her family survive since they had lost everything.

Regina blinked fast. At the moment, the engine grew louder as the jet started to move down the runway. She nearly stumbled as it jolted forward.

"Sit down," he said.

Ignoring the lump in her throat, she braced her arm against the ceiling and lifted her chin. "Don't you dare tell me-"

"Sit down," he barked.

Her knees failed beneath her and she fell on the white leather couch with a whomp. She realized to her shock that her body had obeyed him, even when her mind had refused.

The plane accelerated down the runway as he sat beside her. She gripped the armrest. He calmly reached for his laptop.

Once they were airborne, Regina glanced out the tiny window. All she could see was endless darkness with eerie moonlit clouds.

No one could help her now. She was on her own. She took several deep breaths, trying to keep herself from panicking, "Where are you taking me?"

He didn't answer. He stared at the screen of his laptop and typed rapidly, then took a sip of his Scotch that the smiling stewardess brought him on a tray. Regina waited until they were alone again before she spoke.

"Where are you taking me?" she repeated more forcefully.

"It's irrelevant."

"Tell me where."

"I hardly think you're in a position to make demands."

"You kidnapped me!"

"Such a melodramatic word."

"How else would you describe it?"

"Justice," he said coldly.

"You don't have my passport."

"That's all been arranged."

"How?"

He shrugged. "As everything else it. For a price."

She clenched her hands into fists, "Tell me where we're going right now," she raged. "Or else...or else..."

He looked at her, his blue eyes clearly amused. "Or else?"

Oh, how she wished she had a baseball bat, or even a heavy handbag to threaten him with! She tried to look very evil as she thundered, "You will tell me where we're going or I will make this flight your own private hell!"

Robin stared at her for a long instant. "Now that I believe," he said mildly as his lips quirked. Typing a few last word on his computer, he turned back to face her and said, "I am taking you to Ireland."

"Why?"

"To force Blanchard to give me what I want."

"And that it?"

"If he wants you back, he will agree to a trade."

"Trade?" She stared at him. "What trade?"

"You. For her." Taking another sip of Scotch, he set the tumbler down on the table and looked at her evenly. "I will use you to force him to divorce his wife."

Regina stared at him. Slowly, she lifted her chin.

"I still don't believe you."

Robin frowned. "Is it really possible-" he searched her gaze with narrowed eyes, "that you did not know?"

She shook her head. "There is nothing to know! You've made a horrible mistake!"

"Did he think pretending to marry you was the only way he could keep you in his bed?"

To keep Leopold in her bed? Regina gaped at him. She'd never been in his bed, or any man's.

"How do I know you're not lying about all this?" Regina asked.

"I am telling you the truth, Regina," he said quietly.

She stared up at him. His face was too brutally masculine to be called conventionally handsome. Instead, Robin had a hard, square jawline with stubble. His hair was cut short, above his ear. His blue eyes were so striking.

As he leaned forward, looking into her eyes, she was aware of the warmth and strength of his body. Against her will, she was suddenly aware of the rhythm of his breath, deep and in time with hers. She was aware of his scent, the masculine combination of some kind of woodsy cologne and musk and leather.

He was so close to her. So close.

With a ragged breath, she looked away.

"Who is she, then?" Regina asked in a whisper. "His wife?"

"Marian Maidens."

"Maidens? But the parents are dead," Regina recalled. "Their only child is about my age. I read she left for college."

"She's in a coma," he said brutally. "No one knows she needs help. And I can't find her and get her to a hospital." His blue gaze traced over her. "But you, I can use to trade for her."

She shook her head, dazed.

"You are the most beautiful woman I've ever seen. Except for that." He frowned as his eyes narrowed. "Take that off."

"What?"

"Your dress. Take it off."

"What are you talking about?"

"The wedding dress is an insult. To her. To me. Take it off. You are not a bride."

"I was going to be."

"Take off that dress," he growled. "Or I will take it off for you."

"I have nothing else to wear!"

He gave her a smirk, "That is not my problem."

She rose to her feet in fury, lifting her chin. "I have a right to wear this. I was to be a bride. You are nothing more than a...a thief!"

He swiftly rose to his feet, like a predator. "Call me that again."

She tossed her hair, glaring up at him with all the fury of her five feet, four inches. Her eyes glittered as she met him toe to toe. "You are a thief!"


	4. Chapter 4

**_(Thanks to Bekki for beta reading this.)_**

* * *

 _"_ _You're a thief!"_

Those words hit him hard, and she would have no idea how deeply they bothered him. When he was younger, his family had been desperate, he had been desperate enough to pick pocket some people. It had not been an easy decision to do this, because he knew it was wrong. But he had also been desperate enough, he couldn't stand by and let his mother starve.

One day, he had just ventured out into the sidewalks of England, and been caught by a woman. "Stop! You thief!" she had yelled at him.

Robin blnked. Thief. Same accusation. Very different woman.

He stared now at the young brunette who stood before him in the cabin of his private jet. Regina Mills was magnificent. She was petite, but he also noticed her full breasts swelled up against the bodice with every angry breath. Her waist was tiny, the perfect span for a man's hands. Her dark hair fell back in waves as she tossed her head, her chignon now completely collapsed, exposing her exquisite throat. Her dark eyes glittered at him in fury.

"I don't believe anything you have to say," Regina cried. "You're nothing more than a thief."

A thief. To Robin, the integrity of a man's promise equaled his worth as a man. It was the one accusation he could not endure. In cold rage, he gripped her shoulders.

"I'm selfish," he ground out. "Ruthless. Even cruel at times. But not a liar. Never that."

His gaze fell to her mouth, where she was chewing on her lower lip. He saw her lick her lips with her wet pink tongue, and his body tightened.

He wanted her. And in this moment, the layers of her wedding dress were all that separated them.

 _The wedding dress._

She was continuing to defiantly wear it, as a visual, physical insult to Robin and to Leopold's real wife. As if Marian were already forgotten. As if she were already dead!

Robin's hands slowly moved down her arms, against the see through lace of her sleeves. His lips turned down grimly.

"I told you to take that dress off."

He felt her shiver, even as she stuck out her chin and glared at him with her beautiful dark eyes.

"No," she said defiantly.

"Then I will take it off for you."

Her eyes widened, "You wouldn't dare to-"

With a rough motion, he ripped apart the shoulders of her wedding dress, tearing through the layers of white lace and popping the line of tiny white buttons off the back. He yanked the sleeves down her arms with such force that she staggered forward, nearly falling to her knees.

He discarded the haute couture gown, with its elaborate layers of white lace and tulle to the floor of the airplane cabin. He started to press the intercom button to call one of the attendants for a robe. Then he froze.

Regina stood before him, the wedding dress crumpled like a table cloth at her feet. All she wore was the white silk lingerie intended for her wedding night, a tiny white bra, lacy thong panties and white stockings attached with a garter belt.

He could not look away from the vision of her half naked body, of her creamy skin and perfect curves. He gaped at the perfect hourglass shape of her petite body, at her full breasts and hips, at her tiny waist, and nearly gasped aloud.

Insult or not, he'd been a fool to take the wedding gown off of her. The image of her beauty was dangerous. _To him!_

He should have known she'd be wearing white lingerie for her wedding night to Blanchard. Pretending to be a virgin, just pretending, because he'd obviously been bedding her for some time. No man would resist Regina's charms, her soft dark hair, her lush body. They must have been lovers from the moment he had gotten her alone.

Blanchard was guilty. But was Regina? Had she known about Marian?

 _It doesn't matter_ , he told himself harshly. Whether or not Regina had known about Marian, she'd been eager enough to marry Blanchard for the sake of his money. Everyone had their price. Robin learned that long ago. Feelings were a commodity like everything else.

And yet Robin's eyes traced unwillingly over her beautiful, near naked body.

Regina's cheeks were red as she looked down, breathing rapidly. She started to cover herself with her slender arms. Then she stopped, gripping her hands into fists at her sides. Slowly, she lifted her chin, her eyes glittering at him in fury.

 _What a woman_ , he thought in amusement. Even now, completely in his power, when any other woman might have been frozen with fear, Regina defied him.

"You owe Leopold a wedding dress now," she said in a low voice. "As well as a diamond tiara. And a bride."

With dignity of a Queen, she bent to pick up the dress, then used the tattered remnants to cover herself.

Why did he want her like this? How could this mere woman, this day care worker, have such an overwhelming effect on his body?

Setting his jaw, he reached for her. She looked up with an intake of breath, but instead of ripping the dress from her hands, he helped her cover herself with it. He slowly moved his fingers up her naked arms. Her skin was smooth and warm.

She looked up at him in bewilderment. Her lips parted. Her full, delectable pink lips, so ripe for a man's plunder.

Suddenly, Robin knew what he had to do. He knew just the way to learn the truth about her innocence or guilt.

 _He would kiss her._

If she were truly the heartless gold digger he'd first believed, she would not allow his kiss, she would try to lure him into a full scale seduction. To evade punishment, she would change allegiance, wanting to win him over to her side.

If not...

Well, Robin would put her to the test.

The fact that he could think of nothing but kissing her had nothing to do with this. It was a scientific experiment.

 _The hell you say!_

He admitted to himself, that satiating his desire would be just a fortunate bonus.

After he'd replaced the torn dress over her shoulders, Regina gripped the gaping front bodice together with her hand and glared at him with such hostility.

"Don't think that you can bully me into being afraid of you, because I'll never-"

Her words ended in a gasp as Robin seized her in his arms. Lowering his mouth to hers, he brutally kissed her.

His lips were hard and hot against hers, overwhelming Regina's senses in a ruthless assault.

She stiffened, pressing her hands instinctively against his chest. He leaned her back, deepening the kiss, forcibly pressing her lips apart. As he plundered her mouth with his tongue, she felt a shock of sudden pleasure so sharp and raw that she gasped. As his lips moved against hers, forcing her to respond, she was swept beneath the waves of sensation. He held her tightly and she felt the world swirl and twist around them, lost in a spinning current of desire she'd never experienced before.

She tasted the sweetness of his breath, the taste of Scotch on his tongue. She felt the roughness of his jaw against her skin, the heat of him against her body.

Overpowered by his strength, and the intensity of his commanding embrace, she surrendered. She was briefly lost in the stroking touch of his fingers against her bare back, in the feeling of his muscular thighs straining against hers. He held her in his strong arms, keeping her from falling to the floor.

Without her mind's permission, her lips moved against his. She had no idea what she was doing, but pleasure such as she'd never felt before ripped through her body with sweet agony, making her tremble and shake. She reached her arms around his neck, as if to pull him closer, as if she knew that he and only he could provide the air she needed to breathe.

Then she realized what she was doing. With a choked gasp, she ripped herself away from him. Staring up at him in horror, she sucked in her breath.

Drawing back her hand, she slapped his face.

Robin stared at her with surprise, his hand on his reddening cheek.

"How dare you kiss me!" she shouted, her hand still throbbing with pain from the strength of her blow.

"The kiss was merely to obtain the answer to a question," Robin said calmly.

"Which question?" Regina asked.

He shrugged. "You did not know Blanchard was married, or you would have tried to seduce me, to win me to your side. Which, with that clumsy kiss, you assuredly did not."

 _Clumsy?_ Her cheeks became red as she sucked in her breath. She was clumsy?

It had been the most erotic kiss of her life, and also her first kiss. Not that she would ever dare tell him that. She had had no time dating. She had to work two jobs, to keep food in the kitchen, to keep a roof over their heads.

"I see now that you're not guilty of any crime," he said carelessly, "except being gullible and naive."

Regina stared at him. Well, maybe she was. Her lips still felt bruised when he'd kissed her. What was wrong with her? How could she have kissed him back, even for an instant? How could she have let her body utterly overrule her brain, and her heart?

"Don't touch me again."

"I won't."

Swallowing, she looked away. The electricity that had coursed through her body when he'd kissed her had been nothing like she'd ever felt before. She'd certainly never felt that way around Leopold.

She hated him, but not half so much as she hated herself at that moment.

"I mean it. If you try to kiss me again," she said in a low voice, "I will kill you."

"You are threatening me?" he sounded amused.

"Yes," she snapped. It was no doubt stupid to threaten to kill a ruthless millionaire while trapped on his jet, but she was so angry and humiliated, and so overwhelmed still by the force of his kiss, the kiss he'd called clumsy, that she was beyond good sense.

His lips twisted into an amused half smile as he considered her. "All right."

"All right."

"All...all right?"

"I won't kiss you again."

She frowned, wondering if it was a trick. "You won't."

"I give you my word," he said carelessly. "I won't kiss you again. Not unless you beg me."

"Perfect," she said, wrapping her arms around her shivering body. "Because I will never, ever ask you to kiss me."

Turning away, he sat down and reached for the tumbler, finishing the Scotch in one easy swallow. "Now that we have that settled..." He pressed the intercom. When a flight attendant entered, he told her abruptly, "Miss Mills is tired. Escort her to the bedroom."

Regina whirled on him. "Your bedroom! I should have known it was a trick-"

"I will stay here," he interrupted. He gave Regina one last glance with his sparkling blue eyes. "You have nothing to be afraid of now. Go rest. We will land in a few hours."

Tucked in a tiny private bedroom at the back of the plane, Regina spent the remainder of the flight sitting in a hard chair beside the window, clutching her tattered wedding dress to her chest beneath a blanket, and staring out at the dark night.

Remembering the dark power of his embrace was like fire through her limbs. She still felt the hard beat of his mouth against hers, forcing her lips apart as he took her at his will.

The shock of pleasure had been beyond words. Beyond reason. And she hated him for it.

She stared out the tiny round window into the darkness. She tried to think of something else. Was her mother worried? She closed her eyes as she prayed that he would be arrested once they landed in Ireland. But as she drifted off to sleep, she dreamed of Robin handcuffed to the bed...

Her eyes flew awake as she felt his hand shaking her awake. She looked up to find him smiling down at her.

"So milady, what were you just dreaming of?" Robin asked.

"Nothing," Regina answered.

Narrowing his eyes, he held out his hand to her, "You'll be more comfortable in the house."

She folded her arms coolly, "I'll stay here, thank you."

"Don't you wish to speak with your would be husband on the phone?" Robin asked.

She rubbed her eyes wearily. Just thinking about how worried her mother must be made her need that phone call more than anything on earth. She glared up at her captor.

"Do you give your word that you do not intend to harm me?"

He curled his lip. "I would never hurt a woman." He rubbed his cheek ruefully.

"I had a right to defend myself," Regina said defiantly.

He looked down at her, "I would expect no less of you."

He wasn't staring at her with that hot light of hatred anymore. And yet there was still an undercurrent between them that she didn't understand. She couldn't let Robin to make her doubt that Leopold was married already. She didn't know Robin, couldn't trust this brutal, powerful man who'd kidnapped her, Leopold's enemy who'd kissed her against her will.

Slowly, she rose to her feet, holding the torn bodice of her wedding gown tightly over her chest. "As long as I have your word that you won't hurt me."

He gently brushed her hair from her cheek. Lowering his head, he whispered in her ear, "I will not harm you."

He drew back, looking down at her. Then he held out his hand, steady and strong and confident. She stared at it. Then, not touching him, she brushed past him regally, as if she word a crown on her head.

Her gown still covered her body decently well, as long as she held together the bodice at the jagged, gaping rip over her heart. But she had to hold it tightly. The tulle skirts were heavy and wide, pulling behind her like a train as she went down the steps to the tarmac.

Several cars were waiting, including a black Bentley. As she approached, a uniformed driver opened the passenger door.

"If you please," Robin said quietly, pressing his hand gently against her back. She shivered at his touch, and then jumped forward as if he'd burned her.

Silently, he followed her.

The black car drove through the dark night; she looked out and saw moonlight, trying to memorize anything that stuck out. "Are we near Dublin?"

He didn't answer her.

"Where are we going to be staying?" She tried again.

"One of my homes," Robin answered.

"How many do you have?" Regina asked.

"I own several," he answered.

Her mouth fell open, "Why on earth would you own several?"

"That's my business," he answered.

"Of course, owning several houses has to get so dull at times," Regina said sarcastically. "From someone who has obviously never known what it's like to do without."

"I'll have you know, my grandfather was a fisherman who had an old shack, and after I replaced it with a villa, I never wanted to go back there," Robin informed her.

Robin had once been poor? For a moment, sympathy threatened to prey on Regina, weakening her. Then she hardened her heart and glared at him.

"It must suck to be you," she said acidly. "Owning so many houses, forced to travel all over the world. Kidnapping women who are about to get married. You're clearly a hard case." She glanced out the car window. "So why are we here?"

He turned to look out the window, blocking her view of his face. "I brought you here because this is my home."

Regina's jaw dropped.

"You brought me to your home? But, but..." She faltered, then said, "Leopold will know where to find you!"

He turned back to her. "Exactly."

"I don't understand. What kind of kidnapping is this?" Regina asked.

"I told you. It's not a kidnapping. It's a trade."

The car stopped and the driver opened the door, Robin climbed out, then held out his hand back to her.

Careful not to touch his hand, she tripped and stumbled out of the car. She glanced back at him, blushing. He pulled back his hand, tucking it behind his back. "Come," he said, regaining his low, mocking voice. "I'm sure you're eager to see the inside of your prison, milady."

But he didn't try to touch her again. She was relieved. After his electric kiss earlier, after feeling the strength of his body and the heat of his embrace that had made her surrender against her will, she was afraid to let him so much as brush his fingertips against her skin.

Following him toward the house, she looked up. Her footsteps faltered.

It was a huge house, two story estate. It was clearly set on dozens of acres.

She caught up with him inside the tall doorway. She only dimly saw the servants awaiting them, greeting Robin in low, respectful voices before they disappeared down dark hallways.

He pulled her into a high ceilinged library edged with leather bound books. When he opened the French doors to the veranda, a cool breeze blew into the room, curling up her spine. Regina shivered.

Robin turned back to her. "Are you hungry?"

"No," she whispered, then closed her eyes, trying not to cry. "I just want to call home."

"Home?" he asked, his lips curving sardonically. "Not your lover?"

She blinked. She'd actually forgotten about Leopold for a moment. But it was only natural, she told herself. She'd didn't love Leopold, not in the slightest. She was only doing this to help out her family.

Robin pulled out a phone, dialed a number and handed it to her, "Here."

She stared at him in surprise, her mouth gaping as she held the phone in her hand, "Is this a trick?"

"It's ringing," he pointed out.

With a gasp, she pushed the phone to her ear. When she heard Leopold's voice on the other end, she couldn't believe it, "Leopold, I need to speak to my mother."

"Regina?" he said, his voice more high pitched than usual. "Where are you? One of my guards found the smashed tiara in the road. Your mother is worried sick. Why did you leave?" His voice waivered.

"I've been kidnapped, I'm in Ireland!" she yelled.

There was silence on the other end. Then Leopold spoke grimly.

"Locksley," he said, "Locksley took you, didn't he?"

How had he known that?

"Yes," she choked out. "And he-"

"What did he tell you?" Leopold asked.

She turned away so Robin couldn't see her tearful face as she whispered into the phone, "He's told me all kind of lies. He said you were already married, that the tiara was fake, that the wedding was going to be fake."

She waited for Leopold to tell her that of course all that was a lie, that of course she would have been his legal wife and that he'd be calling Interpol immediately.

Instead, there was silence.

"It's complicated," he said finally.

The word was shocking to her soul, "Complicated?"

"I pawned my grandmother's tiara a few years ago, but the glass version looks almost the same," he said defensively. "I intended to buy it back, but never got around to it. Your engagement ring is real though!"

Why was he talking about jewelry? Who cared about that? She choked out, "But the other things-"

"Well, technically I suppose you could say that I was already married, but my so called wife has been comatose for a year. She's a vegetable. I never loved her, Regina, but I needed money, you have to understand. I have an image to uphold. And I swear to you," he said urgently, "Marian means nothing to me."

"You're married" Regina whispered numbly, feeling like she was in a nightmare. She felt Robin move behind her, felt the warmth emanating off his strong body. "Our wedding would have been fake today."

"I had no choice. You wouldn't let me touch you!" Leopold said. "I hired an actor to do the vows. It was easy. None of my friends knew about Marian. The day after we eloped, my stupid, brainless wife drove her car into a telephone pole."

Regina sucked in her breath.

"You're the one I want, my perfect bride," Leopold said. "My wife could die any day."

"You..." Her throat closed. It took her a minute to force out the words. "You want her to die?"

"Of course I do!" he said. "I need you, my beautiful Regina. You have to believe-"

But Regina heard no more. The phone fell from her numb hands, clattering to the marble floor.

She stared dimly at the diamond sparkling ring on her hand. She'd pledged to marry this man, a man heartless enough to want his wife dead.

How could she have been such a fool not to see all this?

Her knees collapsed. Peeling the diamond ring off her finger, she threw it across the room, where it ricocheted off the bookcase. Covering her face with her hands as she wept, she sank to the white marble floor.

Robin picked up the ring from the floor, along with the dropped phone. He sat the phone to his ear.

"So," he said coolly. "Shall we trade?"

She dimly heard Leopold's furious shouting in response.

"This is my last offer," Robin said carelessly. "I will allow you to keep your home, even to keep the car you bought with her money. But you will give her up, along with the rest of her fortune. You will complete the divorce within the week. Or you will regret it."

More shouting.

Robin's gaze darkened as he looked down at Regina. "We both know you will agree. And Blanchard? Do it as soon as you can. Your mistress is a beautiful woman." His lips curved into a cruel, sensual smile. "Any man would commit crimes to possess her."

After he ended the call, the library went silent. Regina only heard low, soft snuffles that she realized were her own sobs.

Her captor stood over her, and she felt his silent, considering gaze upon her. She tried to stifle her weeping but she could not. All she could think of was that Robin had been right. Leopold only wanted her body; he had only been waiting...

"He's waiting for his wife to die," she whispered aloud.

She felt Robin touch her arm. "I know."

She looked up. His blue eyes were surprisingly gentle.

"Come," he said in a low voice. "You've had a rough day. I'll take you to bed."

She was unable to resist as he took her hand in his larger one, lifting her to her feet. She trembled at his touch, barely feeling strong enough to hold the bodice of her wedding gown closed with her other hand. She pressed her fingers against her heart. She felt faint, her knees weak as she tried to walk. Stopped.

She looked up at him in the dark, shadowy hallway. She saw the roughness in his expression. He was everything Leopold was not, truthful.

Abruptly, Robin lifted her into his strong arms, holding her against his chest. She felt the rush of electricity, the overwhelming awareness sizzling through her just as it had when he'd first touched her, when he'd kissed her on the plane.

He didn't know that it had been her first real kiss. And that her whole body trembled now with all the desire and yearning in her years of loneliness. He carried her down the hallway and up a sweeping flight of stairs. The rhythm of his footsteps was heavy with the marble floor, mingling like percussion against the music of the roaring surf outside.

She glanced at his face. His expression was unreadable. And he held her so gently. She'd thought him some kind of demon, but perhaps he wasn't. Perhaps he was a dark angel, who'd unexpectedly come to save her.

At the end of the hall, he used his shoulder to push open a door with a low creak. Supporting Regina's body with one arm as if she weighed nothing at all, which she probably did, compared to him, he switched on a small lamp with his free hand.

She dimly saw a large bed, the walls were silver, the bed was black. The wide windows had a balcony overlooking the moonlit grounds.

He set her down on the bed. Looking down at her, his eyes locked on her, and full of hunger. He was going to kiss her again. She knew it. He was going to kiss her, despite his promise. Promises meant nothing to him. They'd meant nothing to Leopold. Now, Robin would be the one to possess her. He would take everything she had planned to give to Leopold.

Regina no longer had the strength to fight.

He pushed her back against the enormous bed. Slowly, he pulled the fabric of her bodice from her clenched fingers, leaving her silken bra and the bare skin of her belly in clear view. She felt the magnetic force of his body over her own, his powerful strength and size as he stared down at her, pinning her with his blue eyes.

She stared at him numbly. She had to fight. Why couldn't she fight? She breathed ,"I...I hate you."

His sensual mouth curved as he looked down at her. "I don't need you to love me."

Regina closed her eyes, waiting for him to rip her wedding dress down her legs and throw his body over hers, waiting for him to ravish her without hesitation, to ruthlessly seduce her naked body.

She almost didn't care. She'd lost herself completely. She felt nothing now.

Then he touched her.

His fingertips were feather light, running along her bare collarbone to her shoulder. Strange sensations coursed throughout her body, an odd tumble of emotions that frightened her. Something in her made her tremble deep inside her.

His hands moved slowly down the naked valley between her breasts, causing prickles to spread all over her body. His hands sizzled everywhere he touched. Her breasts felt heavy, her nipples tightening to aching points beneath the silky white bracelet that Leopold had insisted on ordering for her from Paris. She'd blushed when he'd given it to her. Now, she was wearing it in front of his enemy.

His fingers moved down her bare belly to the tattered wedding down pulled down around her waist. He gently pulled the layers of lace and tulle down her legs, then dropped it to the floor in a crumpled heap.

"I knew I'd get that off you eventually," he whispered.

She started to reply, then saw that he'd fallen to his knees at the foot of the bed. The image of him kneeling before her half naked body was so shocking that she squeezed her eyes shut.

But if anything, the sensation only grew more intense as she felt his hands on her thigh, unhooking a lace garter that held up her white silk stocking. The warmth of his breath curled against her naked belly, and she gasped with the sweet agony of forbidden desire. She shouldn't feel like this, not with a stranger!

He slowly pulled the stocking down her leg, his fingers brushing her skin from her thigh to her knee. The sensual silk slid down her calf, down her ankle to the sensitive hollow of her foot. And suddenly her leg was bare. He moved on the mattress, moving up between her legs. With a gasp, she opened her eyes.

He was looking down at her, his eyes hungry. Holding her gaze with his own, he tossed the stocking to the floor. Reaching for her other thigh, he unclasped the garter and moved the second stocking down her leg, sliding the silk down her skin like the whisper of a caress.

Heat built inside her, coursing through her body, sizzling her with his every look and every touch. Tension tightened her nipples to aching points, coiling low in her belly. Her breaths came in increasingly quick gasps.

She couldn't do this! He was her captor, a criminal, a stranger to her! She shouldn't let him touch her!

But even as her mind screamed for her to push away, she couldn't move. She just lay there on the soft cotton sheets, feeling the breeze from the open window, seeing it wave through white translucent curtains. Biting her lip until it bruised, she looked up at his face.

He stroked her hollow belly with concern, "So thin," he murmured. "Why?"

It broke the spell. She sat up abruptly.

"Gullible. Skinny," Regina said bitterly, as her fingers gripped the cotton sheets, pulling them up. "You are cruel. Leopold at least said I was the most beautiful woman in the world-"

Then she remembered how Leopold had lied to her.

Robin's fingers stilled. "Blanchard did not lie," he said quietly. "You are the most beautiful woman I've ever seen."

He pushed her down firmly with his rough hands, and she did not resist. She closed her eyes. When she felt a soft sheet cover her body, she looked at him in shock. He lifted a white goose down comforter over the sheet. And suddenly, she realized what he was doing. He wasn't trying to seduce her.

He was tucking her in for the night.

"You're leaving me?" she whispered as he turned away. "Just like that?

He paused at the door, his expression half hidden by shadow. The dim golden light illuminated the edges of his muscular body as he spoke to her without turning around. "Good night."

"I don't understand. Why are you acting like this?"

"Like what?"

"Like a gentleman. Like...like a good person."

Abruptly, he clicked off the light, and the room fell into darkness. "Don't think I'm a good person," he said in a low voice. "If you do, you'll regret it. Till the day you die."

And he left, closing the door heavily behind him, locking her in, alone.


	5. Chapter 5

_**(A/N-Special thanks to Bekki boo for beta reading this. And to those who read, review, follow and fav, thank you!)**_

* * *

Regina woke up the next morning to find sunshine flooding her with white, almost binding clarity. It refreshed her, washing away the dark nightmares that had troubled her all night. Yawning, she blinked sleepily. _It was a dream,_ she thought. _Thank heaven it was all a dream._ She was back in her own bed...then she blinked.

She sat up abruptly. Her blankets fell to her waist as she stared around her. _This was not her bedroom._ She glanced down at the white silk bra and panties that she'd slept in. A blush heated her cheeks as she remembered Robin moving over her on the bed last night, his body so close to hers as he slowly undid her garters and pulled her silk stockings off her legs. She could still feel the intensity of his mouth on hers when he'd kissed her on the plane. She touched her lips as she recalled how his lips had seared her, how he'd crushed her to his chest and taken her in a hard, hungry embrace, his tongue sweeping her as he-

"Good Morning."

She looked up from the bed with a gasp, yanking her sheets back up to her neck.

Robin leaned in the doorway, dressed casually in lounge pants a white wife beater shirt that revealed his tanned, muscular arms.

"Good morning," she choked out a reply, her mouth was so dry. She then realized she was biting her bottom lip as she continued to look at him, and promptly let go of her lip. She remembered last night with him on top of her and wished they had continued.

"I hope you slept well," he gave her a dark sensual look. "I unlocked your door. I'm here not to give you what you need."

 _Had he somehow guessed what she'd just been thinking?_

"What?" she said in a strangled voice.

He sat down on the bed beside her. "Here."

He placed a silver tray in her lap that held a silver coffeepot, chocolate croissants, fresh fruit, fried potatoes and orange juice. Staring down at it, her mouth watered. "You, you brought me breakfast?" she said numbly.

"You looked hungry last night."

She was. But something else caught her eye. Surprised, she reached across the tray to a bud vase that held a tiny pink rose. She breathed in the delicate scent of the bloom. "And this? Am I supposed to eat this?"

He shrugged. "It reminded me of you."

" _You_ picked a flower?"

"I do know how," he said dryly. "I have my gardener grow them in our greenhouse in winter." He paused. "My aunt grew polyanthus rose bushes, fairy roses. They were the only bit of beauty we had then, her weeping rose tree." He looked at the tiny flower. "It's so delicate, the bloomed barely bigger than my thumb, and yet it's stronger than it looks. It resists disease, poor soil. Even men. "He gave a slight smile. "The thorns are vicious."

She looked at the flower, then him, still shocked.

"It's my way of saying I'm sorry for the way I kidnapped you," he said with a sigh. "If I'd known you were innocent, that you hadn't deliberately set out to replace Marian, I would have..." Leaning back, he raked the back of his hair with his hand, then gave her a smirk. "Well, I would still have kidnapped you, but I'd have been more courteous about it."

"Oh," she said faintly. It made her nervous to have him so close to her again. He was brutally handsome. And the smile he was giving her now was nothing short of devastating. Quickly, she looked back at the breakfast tray. "This looks delicious. I suppose now you'll tell me you cooked it yourself?"

"No." His sensual mouth quirked. "But I run a full service prison here. Room and board included."

"Nice." She lifted her eyes to him suddenly. "It would be even nicer if you'd let me go."

He blinked, his eyes hardened slightly. "But we already agreed that I am not nice. I am a businessman. And you are too thin. No more diets, you will eat."

"I wasn't on a diet," she said, strung. "I wasn't even trying to lose weight. I just could never relax around Leopold. I never had an appetite."

"You found him unappetizing? Shocking," Robin said, lifting his eyebrow. "But you are in my care now."

Regina scowled at him as she smelled a whiff of coffee, it smelled divine, the croissants looked flaky and buttery. Her stomach grumbled. She hadn't eaten a thing since yesterday. Or was it the day before?

So rather than argue with him, she took a deep breath and placed the napkin on her lap. She took a bite of chocolate croissant, and her eyes widened. "Mmm!" she breathed, and quickly ate another bite, and another.

"That's what I like," he said approvingly.

She took a big swig of orange juice. "I can relax around you, Robin. I don't need to be perfect for you," she gave him a sudden grin "because you're basically a terrible person."

"I am," he agreed. Leaning forward, he suddenly stroked her upper lip.

Electrified, she stared up at him in shock. "Why did you do that?"

"Orange juice on your lip," he said.

She swallowed. How could he do that? How could Robin, with just one touch, make her completely forget who she was and what she was doing?

"Go on," he said. "Don't stop now. I want you nice and healthy when I trade you for Marian."

Her smile faded.

Trade. Yes. Of course he wanted her healthy, so he could trade her like a horse. Maybe he'd find a way to sell her by the pound. Biting her lip, she looked down at her tray.

"How can you be so sure he'll still trade me?" she said in a small voice. "Leopold is married. He can't love me. If you're married, you can't love someone else."

Robin's blue eyes gleamed. "You really believe that?"

"Of course I do," she said fiercely. "He doesn't love me, and I can't love him."

"Why not?" he asked curiously. "Once he'd divorced he'll be free to legally wed you. But he will no longer have Marian's fortune. Is that the problem?"

She had to choke back a laugh, "I don't care about money. My family has been broke for years."

"So?"

"Marriage is meant to be forever. Call me naive but I do believe in happy endings, maybe not for myself anymore. If I ever do marry it will be to someone who knows what a promise means. True love is magic" she said.

His eyebrows lifted.

"You surprise me," he muttered. "I never expected any woman, let alone a woman who looks like you, to be..."

"To be what?" she demanded.

"Old fashioned," he said quietly. "A woman who believes in honor and commitment? A woman who cannot be bought?" He shook his head. "I didn't know there were any such left in this world."

Regina's cheeks felt hot. Was he mocking her, calling her foolish? She already felt like enough of one for a whole lifetime.

"It's not so rare," she said, defensively, folding her arms. "Lots of people feel that way."

Robin just continued to stare at her, as if she was an illusion to him. Something he had never seen before. Never been in a presence such as hers.

"Won't you let me call my mother and tell her what's happened?" she asked.

His eyebrows lowered as he shook his head. "Sorry. Too risky. Your mother might call the police. I know Leopold will not."

"Fine," she whispered, looking away. "I still don't understand how he could do such a horrible thing as pretend to marry me."

Robin cupped her chin, forcing her to meet his gaze. His blue eyes went through her, causing a flicker of heat against her skin, spreading down her body. He moved closer to her, so close that she felt consumed by the intensity of his gaze. "He wanted to make sure no other man could have you."

She took a deep breath. What would he say if he knew he was actually the first real man to have kissed her? Would he think she was a freakish old maid? She covered her face with her hands. "I feel pathetic."

"Regina," Robin's voice was low. "I was wrong to call you naive. You just believe the best of people. It's a rare quality these days."

She felt the warmth of his arms start to encircle her. No! She couldn't let this happen, or she might completely collapse into his arms again. She jerked back away from him on the bed, looking up at him fiercely. "If you believe that, let me call my mother and tell her I'm safe."

He blinked at her. "I'm sure Leopold has told her that already."

She thought of her mother, she knew her mother loved her on some form and knew she would be worried. "No. I need to talk to her now."

"I already gave you my answer. No." He abruptly stood up from the bed. "There are a variety of new clothes in the closet for your stay. Enjoy your breakfast."

He left. Regina stared at the closed door.

With a weary sigh, she rose from the bed and went to the closet. There, just as he'd promised, she found an entirely new wardrobe, laundered and pressed, in a variety of colors.

She ran her hands over all the hanging clothes softly, then looked at the shoes stacked neatly beneath. There was every style of clothing possible, everything any woman could want from bikinis and cocktail dresses to oversized sweatpants and t-shirts. From lazy to chic and everything in between. Leopold had always wanted her to dress up and to look chic, like his Queen. She had tried to tell him that she didn't feel comfortable in those things, but he had never listened to her.

She went back to the bed and poured herself some hot coffee into a pretty china teacup on the tray. Taking a sip of the steaming black coffee, she stared at herself in the vanity mirror. She looked awful. Yesterday's wedding makeup was still smeared on her face, black mascara dark beneath her eyes from the emotional drain.

With Leopold constantly telling her she was perfect, when she knew she wasn't, she'd been afraid he would back out of the wedding if she stood up for herself. Regina choked down another sip of black coffee. Her eyes fell upon her wedding dress, still lying in a crumpled heap on the floor where Robin had dropped it the night before. Crossing the room in her bare feet, she picked up the couture gown with two fingers and dragged it into the trash.

There. It was gone. Brushing off her hands, she turned her back on it and felt immediately better. And then, she was hungry!

Going back to the breakfast tray, she dumped three heaping spoonful of sugar into her black coffee, followed by generous amounts of real cream. She took a long drink of the hot, fragrant coffee and it was so sweet and creamy that she gasped with pleasure. She reached back for the buttery, freshly made chocolate croissant and polished it off in three bites.

Carrying the tray to the vanity table, she ate a big bit of a sweet roll. Still chewing vigorously, she pulled Leopold's tarty lingerie off her body and dropped it onto the floor. She stared at it for a moment, then kicked it into the trash as well.

Going into the bathroom, she turned on the shower. Beneath the hot water, she scrubbed her face clean with a rough washcloth, washing off all the old smeared makeup from yesterday, rubbing at her skin until she it was half raw. Her fingers lingered on her lips, where they had been kissed last night by Robin.

Toweling herself off afterward, she automatically looked around for a hair dryer. Then she stopped herself. No. No more hair dryer. No flatiron. No more fuss. Going into the bedroom, she opened a drawer and found a wireless bra and comfortable white panties. Looking into the closet again, she reached for pair of lounge pants and t-shirt. She looked in the mirror again and took a deep breath.

She looked like her old self again. No jewels, no furs, no tiara. Just Regina.

But her eyes had changed. They were exhausted and puffy from crying. She knew yesterday had changed her, and that she would never completely return to her old self again. She went to the chair and table by the window. Opening the screen door, she looked out at the view as she ate the rest of her breakfast, devouring the fresh fruit, potatoes and buttery pastries with equal relish.

Setting down her coffee cup, she wandered outside on the balcony and looked out over the estate. As the cool morning wind blew against her bare skin, she closed her eyes in pleasure, turning her face towards the sun like a flower that had been deprived off it too long. For the first time in a long time, she didn't feel jittery or stressed. She felt...happy.

"Buy it then," Robin's low voice floated up from below. "But not until the price hits forty. By then their shareholders will be screaming and they'll have no choice but to sell."

Looking down with an intake of breath, Regina him pacing by the shaded grove near the pool as he spoke into his cell phone. His black pants were tight around his hips, revealing a very firm behind and the white tank top showed his broad shoulders and taut waistline as sunlight glistened off well-muscled arms.

The sunlight moving against the gray clouds softened the hard lines of his face. He looked ruggedly handsome, and strong. She knew she no longer hated him, either. How could she? If Robin hadn't kidnapped her from the castle last night, she would have given herself to Leopold in bed, believing she was his wife. She would have made the biggest mistake of her life.

All along, her body had told her something was wrong with Leopold. The more often he'd insisted to Regina that she was perfect in every way, the more imperfect she'd felt. Regina knew she was a goofball, impulsive, and all kinds of other silly things, not perfect at all. Besides, what did love, real love, the kind that lasted a lifetime, have to do with sterile, frozen perfection?

"Fine." Still speaking into his phone, Robin suddenly lifted his head and looked right up at her.

Sucking in her breath, she jumped back on the balcony, back into the shadows. "Regina," he said with a low laugh. "I can still see you."

She stepped forward, blushing with embarrassment. "Well, I didn't see you there."

Robin just gave her a lazy smile. "Just come down," he said. "I want to show you something."

From the moment Regina had come out on the balcony, Robin had felt her presence like the first burst of sunlight at dawn. He'd pretended not to see her at first. He'd continued to pace as he spoke, as was his habit when he was making deals over the phone that were worth hundreds of millions of dollars. But as he had discussed business, Robin had secretly watched Regina with hooded eyes.

As he'd watched her, a strange need had trembled through his body that he'd never felt before. He did not like the feeling. He, Robin Locksley, needed no one. He barely knew her, and yet she had some power over him, a power his own body gave her. He understood, more and more, why Leopold had been willing to risk anything and defy anyone to possess her.

Robin still remembered the way she trembled when he'd kissed her on the plane. He'd called her clumsy and it had been true. For a beautiful woman, she'd been astonishingly inept. He still recalled the way her lips had moved so tremulously against his own, as if she had no idea how to move her lips into a kiss. But clumsy was only part of it. He hadn't told her the rest that somehow it had also been the most erotic kiss he'd ever experienced. He'd felt the passion of her brief surrender in a way that nearly brought him to his knees with the force of his own desire.

And then she'd slapped him.

He'd known from that moment that he would have her. Innocent or not, he would have her. His promise not to kiss her until she begged for it was real, but it was strategic. He wouldn't break his word. He wouldn't have to. After that kiss, when he'd felt her passion and fire, he'd known it would be a matter of time before they would end up in bed together.

Now here they were with her standing on the balcony like Romeo looking up at Juliet. But she didn't immediately move to come down. She just blinked at him, tilting her head defiantly. "What?"

Truthfully, he wanted to show her his bed, his naked body, and how thoroughly he could arouse her with his tongue, but all that would have to wait until it was the right timing. "My home," he said smoothly. "You might be here for some time. You should know your way around."

"Thanks, but I'll just stay up here. In my room." Where it's safe, her tone seemed to imply.

He smiled up at her. "Come, Miss Mills. Your captivity doesn't have to be a prison. There's no reason you can't enjoy yourself while you're with me. Come down."

She hesitated, then shook her head, "No. I'll see you later." Then she disappeared back into her bedroom.

She didn't trust herself around him. Robin almost laughed aloud. If she wouldn't come down to him, he could go to her. As he was about to, his cell phone vibrated and he answered, "Locksley."

"Let me talk to Regina," Leopold demanded.

At the sound of the man's demands, Robin headed into his own private office. "Has your divorce been finalized yet?"

"Almost. I'm in Las Vegas. I've signed the papers. It's as good as done. Let me talk to her," Leopold said.

"No." Initiating a divorce meant nothing, as they both knew perfectly well. Until the final ruling, it could be canceled at any time. Robin sat down in his chair. "You can speak to Regina when we make the trade."

"Damn you! Have you touched her? Tell me! Have you kissed her?"

"Yes," Robin said with dark pleasure.

"You son of a bitch!" Leopold choked out. "What else have you done?"

"Just one kiss," Robin said, then added ominously, "so far."

"You filthy brute, don't you dare touch her! She's mine!"

Robin gave a low, deliberate laugh. "Complete your divorce. Return Marian to me as fast as you can. Before your fiancée can't keep her hands off of me. And I enjoy her in my bed, over and over, until she forgets your name."

"Don't touch her, you bastard!" Leopold nearly shrieked. "Don't even think about-"

Robin hung up, still smiling to himself. Then he heard a noise and looked up.

Regina was standing in the open doorway, her mouth wide.

"You heard?" he said finally.

"I just came downstairs to see," she swallowed. "You intend to seduce me just to hurt Leopold?"

"No, Regina, listen-"

She put her hands over her ears. "Don't even try to explain. You're no better than Leopold!" She then turned and ran out of the office.

With a muttered curse, Robin raced after her. She was very fast for a petite woman, and ran all the way down the hall and out of the back door of the hose before he was even out of his office. Outside, he pursued her past the pool and halfway up the hillside.

The sky had grown dark with gray clouds as he grabbed her. She tried to escape, clawing at him, her chest lifting. "Let me go!"

He brought her against his chest. "Quit calling me a liar. I always keep my promises," he ground out. "Always."

"But you said-"

"I said the worst to Leopold because I want him scared of what I might do to you. It is the only way he will divorce Marian and give up her fortune."

Regina stopped struggling, "Why are you so determined to save her?" she whispered. "Who is she to you? Tell me!"

He couldn't tell her. He looked down at Regina in his arms, so petite, so beautiful. He heard the whisper of her breath. He looked down into her wide dark eyes, a sea of emotion for a man to drown in. Her red, full mouth, natural and bare of makeup, parted as she licked her lips.

Clenching his hands into fists, he released her.

"I did not lie," he said, "I will not kiss you unless you ask me."

"You don't intend to seduce me?" she asked.

"I want to seduce you," he said in a low voice. "It's all I can think about. But I gave you my word. I won't so much as kiss you."

She took a deep breath. "Oh." She stared down at the ground. "Leopold said he still wanted to trade for me?"

"He arrogantly assumes he will win back your heart."

"Never," she said. "You're risking a lot to save Marian."

"I am saving her for my own reasons. Because-"

"Because?"

"Because I made a promise to protect her."

"Who is Marian? Tell me, please." Regina said as she looked up at his face. A moment ago, she'd been angry, but now, she was touching his arm, her gaze curious and tender. "Is she your friend?"

Her small hand rested lightly on his skin, and he shuddered beneath that gentle touch. He had to fight the impulse to draw his arm away, or crush her small body beneath the force of his embrace. "It doesn't matter."

"Your lover?"

He looked away.

"Do you love her?"

Robin turned to look down at her, his eyes locking with hers as she first drops of rain started to fall from the gray sky.

"Yes," he bit out. "I love her."

* * *

Robin loved this other woman. His stark words caused a tremble through Regina's heart, a whisper of pain that she couldn't understand, along with a streak of resentment. She swallowed. "And you think once she's in your care, you can save her? You think you can wake her?"

"Her marriage has doomed her to die," he said in a low voice. "I won't allow that to happen. I can't allow that to happen."

Regina looked at him, her heart in her throat. He loved a woman so much he was determined to save her at any cost to himself. That was true love. The kind that would sacrifice anything, do anything, for someone else. "You must really love her," she breathed, "don't you?"

She watched as his blue eyes widened, his lips twisting, "Ah. You think I am some sort of white knight in a fairy tale?"

"Aren't you?" she asked.

He laughed scornfully, "You are quite the romantic, aren't you?"

He said the words like an insult. Regina blushed. "Just because I can see the best of people, then-"

"You are wrong about me." Robin's eyes glittered. "And you're wrong to have such blind faith. Your noble hearted knight does not exist."

Regina took a deep breath, "I believe he does. I'll wait. I'll have faith."

"Faith is a lie that fools tell themselves in the night," Robin said coldly.

She stared at him. "Do you really believe that?"

Robin turned away from her.

She looked at the taut lines of his body. The tanned, muscular arms. Her eyes traced the dark shadows of his jaw, the mussed wave of his dark blonde hair.

Her arms started to reach out to comfort him before she caught herself. Why would her body reach to comfort him? She always worried about other people's feelings but she was way off here, being concerned about him. Robin Locksley was powerful and rich. He could get any woman he wanted, and probably did. So why would Regina possibly think she could comfort him? Or even that he needed comfort?

 _Faith is a lie that fools tell themselves in the night._ It was the most heartbreaking thing she'd ever heard.

"Maybe you're right," she said slowly. She shook her head. "But a life without faith, without being heroic enough to risk loving someone and be loved in return, is no life at all."

His jaw tightened. "I measure success differently. On how I keep my word."

It was almost unbearable now for Regina to keep still, to resist the urge to wrap her arms around him and ask what had left such a deep scar on his heart. Regina had to force her arms to remain at her sides, her hands tightening into fists with the effort it took not to reach her arms around him.

"But such honor is meaningless without love," she said in a low voice. "And you must know that already. It's why you're desperate to save Marian. Because you love her enough to do so."

Slowly, he turned back to her. "It's not what you think."

"It's not?"

He didn't answer. She took a deep breath and changed the subject. "But what if your plan doesn't work?" she said in a small voice. "What if Leopold won't trade her for me after all?"

"It has to work," he blinked, determination in his eyes. "It must."

Regina's heart felt anguished in sympathy for the powerful man before her, who looked so haunted and alone. But just as she could bear it no longer and started to reach for him, Robin's eyes widened to stare at a point behind her ear. He called out and she whirled around to see a bodyguard approaching them rapidly, hurrying up to them. The hulking man spoke into Robin's ears.

Robin's eyes went wide. He inhaled a deep breath that expanded his chest, then turned to her. "Time to go."

"Go?" she stammered. "Where?"

"Right now."

"Why?" she said, bewildered.

Robin seemed back to his old self as he grinned. "I have a new desire to see a tropical beach."

"Why?" she asked, clearly confused.

He put his hand on her shoulder and looked down into her eyes with a deep, smoldering heat. "I want to see you in a bikini."

Before she could say anything further, he turned and headed back to the house with the bodyguard. She stared at him in shock. What had changed his mood?

Regina stomped her foot in frustration, then yelled after him, far too late, "Wherever we're going, if you think I'm going to wear a bikini for you, you're crazy!"

By late afternoon, they had arrived via private jet to an island in the crystal blue waters of the Indian Ocean. Above a white, sandy beach, palm trees swayed in the hot breeze.

"Where are we?" Regina stammered, yawning from her nap as they climbed out of the SUV.

"The Maldives," he said simply. She turned to stare at him in shock.

"How many places do you have?" she asked faintly.

He gave a hearty laugh. "I don't own this one. We're at a resort owned by a friend of mine, Killian Jones. He's assigned a full time housekeeper to this cottage exclusively for our stay. The bodyguards will be at the gatehouse a mile down the road."

Taking her hand, Robin escorted her into a small yellow cottage on a private, secluded beach. Inside the main living area, a fan moved the air from the high wooden ceiling. Through the wall of windows, she saw a private pool and veranda beside the white beach and bright blue waters, beneath swaying palm trees.

Regina had read about Killian Jones' resorts. They were swanky hotels for rich people, the kind of glamorous places she read about in celebrity gossip magazines. Utterly out of reach of a regular person like her.

She glanced around the cottage. Cozy as it was, on a private beach with devoted housekeeper, she still wouldn't be surprised if it cost ten thousand dollars a night. And they would be sharing this intimate space alone. She looked back at Robin, and the cottage suddenly seemed a little smaller.

"There's no television," he said. "But I don't think you'll miss it."

She licked her lips. "Why not? What will we be doing?"

"A selection of new books and magazine has been provided for you. The housekeeper will prepare delicious meals and clean and do anything else you need. You'll have nothing to do but sit on the beach and work on your tan."

She stared at him. Then she scowled, "Meaning, I can't leave."

"You have no need to."

But it meant she couldn't sneak into the local village to look for an Internet cafe or try to telephone her family. She looked around her. There wasn't even a phone here, much less a computer with a modem.

"Do you like the cottage?"

She glared at him. "Sure. It's lovely, for a prison."

"If you wish to regard it that way."

"How else should I see it?"

"You could call it a vacation." Lifting an eyebrow, he gave her a sensual half smile. His eyes traced her body. "It's a pity we have no time to pack in Ireland. Fortunately I've arranged a new wardrobe for you here."

He pushed open the sliding doors to reveal the bedroom. Walking to a closet, he opened the doors.

Peering past him, Regina saw an arrangement of bikinis and several little beach cover ups, scandalizingly short robes of thin cotton lace or translucent gauze. That was it. There was nothing else to wear. Her eyes widened. Leaning back, she put her hands on her hips and scowled at him. "Where's the rest?"

"Oh. Is there nothing in there but bikinis for you?" he said innocently.

But it was worse than that. She sucked in her breath as, looking further inside the closet, she saw men's t-shirts and shorts. A sinking feeling went through her heart. "Why are your clothes in my closet?"

He came behind her, not touching, but close enough that she could feel the warmth from his body. "This is a honeymoon cottage. There is only one bedroom. And only one bed."

 _The honeymoon cottage._

"Oh," she managed to say with suddenly dry lips. She moved away, choking out. "I'll take the couch, then."

He looked down at her. "You will take the bed."

"That wouldn't be fair." Even as she told herself that he was her captor and deserved to suffer, she felt guilty about kicking him to the couch. He'd promised he wouldn't touch her and she was starting to believe him. Hesitantly, she said, "I suppose we could share-"

"No," he cut her off roughly.

"Why?"

"Because being close to you when I am forbidden to touch you...There's only so much a man can take. Unless you actually want so make me suffer."

Their eyes locked, and for an instant, she forgot to breathe. Then she blinked. "A little suffering on your part might be nice, yes," she said with an impish smile.

His returning smile rose slowly across his face, as he started to lean down towards her. And without realizing what she was doing, she leaned upward on her toes. One of his hands cupped the side of her cheek as their lips were only inches apart now. They were so close now, she could feel his breath on the skin of her face as he exhaled.

"Sir." A bodyguard entered the front room with a loud rap at the door, and they both whirled toward him. Exhaling, Robin gave him a quick nod. "Excuse me," he said, turning back to her. "I must leave you now."

"But we just got here!"

"I have something urgent to do. I will return later." He stroked her cheek with his thumb a few times. "I've arranged the housekeeper to serve dinner on the beach. I've left enough guards to keep you safe."

Squeezing her hand, he looked down into her eyes. There was an intensity there, that she had never seen anyone looking at her like. Then he turned and was gone. Regina stared after him in shock.

After he left, she walked along the beach and explored the lush grounds behind the cottage. It was strange to be so alone in this beautiful place. Crossing through a tropical garden, she stopped as her jaw dropped when she saw two large weeping rose trees.

Pink fairy roses. Robin's favorite flower. Growing wild on this island in the Indian Ocean, thousands of miles from Ireland.

Resolutely, she turned and walked away. Then, after five steps she stopped. Whirling, she went back to the nearest rose tree. Careful not to pierce her fingertips with thorns, she picked one of the tiny pink blooms. Returning to the cottage, she carefully put it in water in a tiny bud vase she found in the stocked modern kitchen.

Hours of sunshine later, she finally put aside the novel she was reading on the lanai in the deepening afternoon. She's been alone all day long at a luxury beach house. She's had a lovely lunch served to her by the housekeeper. Reading a novel and watching the sunlight sparkle across the blue waters on the Indian Ocean, kidnapped or not, she should have been having a decent time.

But she wasn't. She was missing something. Or someone.

The thought brought her up short. She couldn't be missing Robin's company. Ridiculous. He was her captor! If she occasionally found him amusing or entrancing she was merely making the best of a bad situation, that was all.

But they'd spent the long flight here talking. He'd sat right beside her, asking about her interest, about her home and family.

She's answered in one word answers at first. But instead of being offended, he'd seemed to enjoy the repartee. And his undivided attention had been strangely pleasurable. She'd felt his arm along the back of the leather seats behind her, so close to her body, and she'd trembled inside. Every time he looked at her, the intensity and heat of his blue eyes on her, turned her inside out. It was like he was looking into her soul.

Regina looked up and saw the housekeeper struggling to carry a table across the beach to a spot overlooking the surf. Regina immediately got to her feet and hurried down to her, "Wait! Can I help?"

The housekeeper, who looked only a few years older than her, shook her head, even as she looked as though she was fighting back tears.

"Please let me help you," Regina said.

The woman burst into tears and Regina learned the the woman was grieving for her husband who she had lost six months ago, and she was very worried about her eight year old daughter who was home with a bad fever, who she had no choice but to leave alone.

"Go home," Regina said.

"But I can't loose this job, if I do I won't be able to keep a roof over our heads," the woman protested.

"Mr. Locksley will never know you left," Regina assured her.

The woman hesitated, "Please, I'm so far from my family. At least let me help yours."

The housekeeper wept and embraced her, then gave her a few instructions on how to make her dinner. Regina assured her she would be fine.

A short time later, she had finished her dinner, although it wasn't what the housekeeper had instructed her to cook. It was just spaghetti and some vegetables. She also showered and washed her hair. Then it hit her what she was going to wear? She considered getting one of Robin's shirts and shorts but the thought of wearing his clothing seemed too intimate. That would be the action of a lover, which she told herself, she would never be.

She finally put on two gauzy beach cover ups layered over a pale pink bikini. She looked at herself and was pleased. The two robes together would block her body from view. That would teach him!

A little while later, she sat down at a table and watched as the sky turned to a red and purple sunset. She jerked awake as she felt Robin shaking her shoulder. With a start, Regina realized she'd fallen asleep.

It was almost dark. His silhouette was black against the fading red sunset. He'd changed on the plane, but she saw that his jeans and t-shirt were dusty and his face was grim. His good mood of just a few hours before was gone.

"What's wrong," she asked. "What's happened?"

"Forget it," he said, sitting in the chair next to her.

"Where have you been?"

He shook his head bitterly. "It doesn't matter. Let's go inside and eat."

"I've already eaten," Regina said.

"Then you can keep me company, I'm sorry I'm so late," Robin said as he grabbed her hand and they went inside. He saw the dinner she had cooked and looked around for the rest.

"I'm going to have to request a complaint, the housekeeper should have-"

"No, it's not her fault. It's mine."

He looked down at her with a frown, "What?"

"I sent her home. I'd told her I'd make dinner," she said. "Don't make a complaint on her, they might fire her."

He slowly sat down, staring at her. "You sent her home? Why?"

"We got to talking and...her husband died recently and her little girl was sick at home alone. She needed help," she said, "so I helped her."

He gaped at her, "You got to talking?" he said faintly. "I have employees who've worked for me for ten years and I don't know anything about their personal lives."

"That's too bad."

"But why would you volunteer to do her work, when you could have just relaxed on the beach? It's her job. Her responsibility. Not yours."

Regina looked out into the growing shadows of the night, listening to the roar of the ocean waves. "I had to help her be with her little girl," she whispered, lifting her chin to meet his eyes. "Because all I want to do is talk to my own mother. She's all I have left for my family."

Silence fell between them.

"I can't risk it," he said quietly. "If you talk to your mother, she might contact the U.S. authorities. A kidnapped young woman is just the sort of sensational story that would be splashed all over the international news."

"What if I gave you my word she wouldn't tell?" she asked desperately.

He shook his head. "I'm sorry."

"Can I at least call the place I work? I want to know how Henry is doing without me," Regina said as her thoughts went to that sweet little boy.

"Who?" Robin asked.

"Henry. He's a baby at the nursery where I work," Regina said.

"I'm sure he's fine," Robin said.

"How can you be so heartless?" She turned to stare at the water. "I had to let her go be with her family. Because I can't."

"I still don't understand."

"Don't you have a family?"

"Not the way you mean."

"No siblings?"

"I'm an only child."

"Your mother?"

"Dead."

"Your father?"

"Died when I was little."

"I'm so sorry." She said as she took his hand in hers and gave it a soft squeeze.

For a moment he didn't move. Then he pulled his hand away. "Let me guess," he said. "You lived in a big old house, you came from school to your mother's home made cookies, and your father taught you how to ride a bike?"

"Most of that, my mother is not the most loving woman, but she's all I have left of my father," Regina said simply.

"Of course, you had the fairy tale," Robin said as he looked away.

She stared at him. The fairy tale?

Standing up abruptly, he reached for her hands and they walked into the kitchen, "Come on, I'll make us some dinner."

He quickly made up some dinner, she picked at her foot, not really hungry, but she had to admit it was really good what she did eat. As he watched her plop a piece of fruit into her mouth, his breathing quickened. He moved her chair closer to him.

He was going to kiss her. She could feel it. He reached out and stroked her cheek, pulling her head towards him as his moved closer to hers. When she was within reach he tilted her head up towards his, and she could barely hear the roar of the ocean over the rapid beat of her own heart.

"I've never met a woman like you before," he said, his blue eyes searching hers as he stroked her bare forearm lightly with his fingertips. "You...amaze me."

This honeymoon cottage, so remote in the middle of an ocean, seemed like their own distant world. His handsome, rugged face, the powerful curve of his body as he leaned toward her, the light feeling of his touch against her skin, made her brain stop working. She trembled, licking her lips. Would she fall into his arms when he kissed her? His bed?

He stopped only inches from her, looking down at her half eaten plate, "Are you finished?"

She stared up at him, unable to even say yes.

He smiled, then took her hand in his own, "Come."

He led her from the kitchen to the large sitting room and sat her down gently on the couch. Going back to the kitchen, he returned with a tray. She watched as he dropped fresh raspberries into a crystal flute. Popping open a bottle of expensive champagne, he poured it over the raspberries then held out the flute to her, watching her with those intense blue eyes.

"What is this?' she whispered.

"I'm making it up to you."

"What?"

"I stole your wedding night from you." When she didn't take the flute, he pressed it into her hand, wrapping his fingers around hers. She could barely breathe as she looked up at him, feeling his large hand wrapped around her smaller one. He said in a low voice, "I'm going to make it up to you tonight."

"How," she stammered.

He stepped back, his gaze still intensely upon her. She felt felt butterflies in her stomach and nervously drank the rest of the delicious raspberry infused champagne. But the butterflies only increased. Robin silently refilled her champagne with a sensual promise in his blue gaze.

Then he left her, going into the adjacent white marble bathroom, with its bathtub for two that overlooked the moonlit sea. He turned on the faucet, starting a hot, steamy bath, filling it with fragrant bubble bath.

He came back to her, "It's ready," he whispered, pulling her to her feet. She gripped his hand, feeling a little unsteady.

He pulled her into the elegant bathroom. Still holding her champagne flute, which somehow had been refilled again, she looked down at the enormous bathtub filled of bubbles. Beyond it, an enormous open window overlooked the moonlit Indian Ocean. She felt the warm breeze of the lanai. Warm steam and the scent of exotic, spiced flowers filled the room.

She felt his touch move like silk against her waist as he opened the belts that held the two gauzy robes to her body. He dropped first one robe, then the other, to the marble floor.

Robin towered over Regina as he looked down at her, his eyes slowly tracing her body as she stood nearly naked in her pale pink bikini. He gave her a dark, sensual smile and a flash of heat raced through her body, causing a bead of sweat to break out between her breasts.

The smile dropped from his sensual mouth.

"Take off your bikini," he whispered.

Without thinking, she reached for the tie behind her neck. Then she realized what she was doing. She dropped her hand.

"I can't," she said. "Not with you right here."

"I'll turn around."

She had a sudden view of his broad shouldered back in the form fitting t-shirt as he turned around. She stared at his form, his slim hips in his jeans, the hardened curve of his backside.

"Done?" he said without turning around.

With a jolt, she put her hands unsteadily to her head. Had she been gawking at him? The bubbles of the champagne made her feel so strangely unlike herself.

She should leave this room immediately. She should tell Robin she had no interest in champagne or warmth or bubbles. She should march into the bedroom alone and close the door. That was the sensible thing to do.

But she suddenly didn't want to be sensible.

She was tired of being the girl who was always alone. Always waiting, as locked away from pleasure as any sleeping princess in a glass coffin.

Regina took a haggard breath. She would have to take a chance, take what joy she could in the life she had. She would take risks. She would be bold.

Slowly, Regina undid the bikini top and dropped it to the floor. She untied the bottom and kicked it away. Climbing naked into the bathtub, she sank beneath the fragrant white bubbles. Closing her eyes, holding her breath, she slid all the way down beneath the water.

She stayed there for several moments, letting the warm waters ease her fears. When she rose from the bath a moment later, her hair soaking wet, she felt reborn.

She heard a choked gasp behind her.

Robin was now standing by the bathtub, staring down at her. Following his eyes, she saw rivulets of water running down between her breasts, saw her nipples flushed deep red. They pebbled beneath his hungry gaze.

With a gasp, she sank into the water, covering her body with thick white bubbles.

"You said you wouldn't turn around!" she yelled.

He gave a low laugh. "I never said I wouldn't turn back." He sat on the edge of the large tub and looked down at her. "You are so beautiful," he whispered, running his hand along her naked shoulder, visible above the bubbles. "The most magnificent woman I've ever seen."

She blushed. "You're just tipsy on champagne."

"I haven't had any champagne."

She blinked, glancing at the nearly empty bottle next to the bathtub. Who'd drunk all that then? By the way her body felt pleasantly separated from her brain, the answer was appallingly clear. She shook her head.

"You...you are trying to..."

"To what?"

"Get me drunk," she blurted out.

His sensual mouth curved, "Why would I do that?"

"I don't know," she said. "You tell me."

He stroked her water slicked dark hair curling over her collarbone. She looked up at him breathlessly, her neck tilting back. He leaned over her, his lips inches from hers. Her mouth inched toward him, wanting him to kiss her. Willing him to kiss her.

"Turn around," he said, and without thought she obeyed, turning her face to the window.

She felt his hands fall heavily on her naked shoulders. He began to slowly rub circles into the overwrought muscles of her neck and shoulders. She closed her eyes. It was bliss. It was heaven. It was...

Dangerous.

"So you think I'm going to all this effort to seduce you?" he asked quietly.

Hearing him actually speak the words made her fears seem ludicrous. He was a powerful, ruthless millionaire with the world at his fingertips. And he'd told her he loved another woman, someone he intended to trade for Regina. She was just his pawn. Why would he go to such effort to seduce her?

"I know that I'm sounding ridiculous," Regina said.

"You're right," he said quietly. "I am going to seduce you."

Her eyes flew open. As he continued to sensually rub her neck and shoulders, she stared wide-eyed out the window. In the silence, she saw the slender black silhouettes of palm trees swaying in front of the brilliant white cloud lit up by the moon, saw the stars twinkling in the night.

She felt the intense pleasure of his touch. Felt his strength. Felt his power.

When he leaned over her, she felt his breath against the crook of her neck, then his lips brushed the tender flesh of her earlobe as he whispered to her. "I want you."

The whisper of his lips against her skin caused a sizzle of fire down her body. "And I intend to do everything I can to win you."

She felt dizzy, the world trembling all around her. She was naked in the warmth of the bath he'd drawn for her, tipsy on his expensive champagne. But most intoxicating of all was this feeling building inside her, this strange ache of forbidden desire. She felt his cotton shirt blush against her hair, felt the warmth of his muscular arms lean against hers.

She closed her eyes, waiting for him to seize her, turn her around in his arms and pull her into his oh so hot embrace. Waiting for him to end this sweet torment.

He was going to kiss her...wasn't he?

"I want you, Regina," he whispered. "So much. He took a sudden deep, ragged breath, then said in a low voice. "But you deserve better than a man like me."

And suddenly his warmth was gone.

Startled, she whirled around. In her movement, she splashed bathwater onto the floor.

All she saw was his retreating back as he left her.

Without a backward glance.


	6. Chapter 6

**_(A/N-Special thanks to Bekki boo for beta reading this and to those who read, review, follow fav.)_**

* * *

 _You deserve better than a man like me._

The next morning, Robin woke up stiff and sore from sleeping alone outside in the hammock on the beach. He still couldn't believe it.

He'd had her. Naked and ripe for the taking. He'd seen it in her body's reaction to his touch, in the quiver of her neck and shoulders beneath the stroke of his fingers, in the flush of her skin.

He'd had her. Getting her to release him from his promise, luring her into just gasping out the words kiss me, would have been the easiest thing in the world. It had taken slightly longer than he'd thought it would, but he'd finally succeeded in getting her where he wanted her. Bedding Regina last night would have been at once his revenge and his reward.

And yet he'd let her go. He'd stumbled away from the bathtub, and her body covered in bubbles, without a word. Once outside he'd stripped off his dusty clothes and dived naked into the sea to clear his body of dust. To clear his soul of desire.

 _You deserve better than a man like me._

Now, raking his hand through his hair, he twisted his aching neck to crack the aching vertebrae. After sleeping outside all night, he cursed himself silently. Why had he let her go last night? Why had he shown such foolish mercy?

" _I'll have faith_ ," he heard her voice in his head like music, and remembered the way she'd looked at him with eyes of endless warmth. " _A life without faith, without being brave enough to risk loving someone and be loved in return, is no life at all."_

He'd come to the Maldives yesterday filled with optimism, after his chief bodyguard had told him Marian had been sighted here. He'd known if he could find her on his own and get her safely to good medical care, he would have no need to deal with Blanchard. Once Marian was well, she could divorce him herself. And Robin, he could keep Regina for himself.

But after almost a year of repeated sightings that proved false, Robin should have known better than to hope. Marian had been seen in a tiny hut down the end of this road. But she'd been moved just twenty four hours before their arrival. The woman who had been taking care of her, had said the sleeping woman still lived. That was all she knew.

Returning alone to the honeymoon cottage, Robin had been furious and angry at Blanchard, but even more at himself.

Why couldn't he find Marian?

Why couldn't he save her?

Why did he keep failing?

When Robin had seen Regina sleeping peacefully at the table on the beach, he'd stopped on the sand. She was lone beneath the sunset, ethereally sexy in those little gauzy robes over a bikini. And he'd suddenly known how he would take out his frustration. How he would take both his solace, and his pleasure.

Before he'd reached out his hand to shake her awake, he'd already decided that he would possess her. He wouldn't force her. He just wanted her to acknowledge their attraction to one another.

Why had he let her go? He rubbed his forehead wearily. Why had he done it? Because he liked her? Because she had a good heart? Because he admired her?

He thought again of her beauty inside and out.

"Did you really sleep out here all night?"

At the sound of her voice, he looked up to discover Regina standing beside the hammock. She was wearing a little white cover up of eyelet cotton and flip flop sandals. Her face was bare and lightly tanned, her dark hair wavy and tumbling down her shoulders.

"Yes," he said shortly.

"You didn't have to do that, you know. You could have slept on the couch." She gave him a tremulous smile. "I don't bite."

"Maybe I do."

"I'm not afraid of you."

At her smile, an ache filled his chest that felt like pain.

"You should be," he whispered.

Morning had dawned over the beach, streaking pink across the sky over the crystalline waves. A fresh breeze blew through the palm trees overhead, causing tendrils of her dark hair to curl across her beautiful face.

And it was then that he saw it in her face, bright as day. Regina actually cared about him.

Something he hadn't had since his mother had died.

The realization jolted him like a kick in the gut. He climbed out of the hammock so quickly that he nearly fell.

"Are you alright?"

"Fine." He straightened, irritated.

"Why did you leave like that last night?" she persisted, in spite of the clear signals. He didn't wish to discuss it.

"For your own good," he muttered.

"What?"

Angrily, he whirled on her. "Just leave it alone. Trust me. You slept better last night without my company."

She stared at him.

"No," she said in a low voice. "You're wrong. I didn't sleep at all." Her beautiful face was heartbreakingly angelic as she whispered. "I couldn't stop thinking about you."

Their eyes met, and he couldn't look away.

He wanted her so badly that his whole body thrummed with it. Painfully. Single-mindedly. He wanted to take her there on the deserted beach, to rip off her white cover up in the pale pink morning, to push her naked body against the sand and kiss and suckle and taste every inch of her skin. He wanted to push himself inside of her, to fill her completely, to ride her until she forgot every other lover, until she was screaming his name.

What was it about this woman that affected him so? The way no other female ever had.

Standing before her in yesterday's t-shirt and jeans, Robin held himself still. His hands clenched with the effort it took not to kiss her. "Why were you thinking about me?"

"You try not to pretend you're selfish and cruel," she said softly. "But I keep thinking about you and coming to one conclusion. You're a good man."

He gave a low laugh, like thunder reverberating across the dark sky. "I am not good." Something snapped inside him and he reached for her shoulders, looking down into her eyes searchingly as he whispered. "But you...you are."

"Oh." She blushed. "I'm not so very good. I've been feeling quite stupid, actually, driving you away from your bed. The couch, I mean."

She was stammering, embarrassed. As if she had anything to feel guilty about, when it had been Robin who had deliberately rented the honeymoon cottage to set the stage for seduction! "Don't worry about it." He looked down at his clothes, no longer dusty but not stiff with dried seawater. "A night beneath the stars is just what I needed."

She bit her lower lip. "Still, I feel badly. No more sleeping outside, all right? Come inside. I've made you some breakfast."

"You did?" He paused, then added dryly. "Is that supposed to be consolation, or punishment?"

"I know how to cook," she said, sticking out her tongue.

He could feel the warmth of her body as he looked down at her. The smile slid from her face as their eyes locked, burning through him.

"Are you sure you can trust me?" he said roughly. "To be alone with you in the cottage?"

Looking up with big eyes, she nodded.

"How do you know?"

"I can feel it. Besides," she suddenly gave him a smile, "you gave me a promise."

She turned and went inside. He stared at her for a moment, then followed her, admiring the sweet curve of her backside with every step. She was starting to fill out a bit, he noticed with satisfaction. He would enjoy continuing to fatten her up. He had the sudden image of Regina, rounded and pregnant with his child.

Oh, my God. Sucking in his breath, he stopped in place, nearly slapping himself on the skull. What the hell madness was this?

"You coming?" she called. He hurried through the cottage, barely noticing the perfectly swept floors and gleaming kitchen as he hurried past the bedroom door and out onto the lanai. The shadowed patio was still cool in the early morning. He saw she'd set up the little table for two. Next to the coffeepot was a plate with buttered toast and a carefully cut bowl of fruit beside the flowers.

She gave him a grin. "See? I know how to cook."

"Fruit and toast?"

"I wanted the housekeeper to stay home until her daughter was well. " She looked at him anxiously.

"This is your idea of a vacation?" He brushed a tendril from her face. "I've never met anyone like you, Regina. The way you care so much for other people. The way you try so hard to make everyone else's life better. You never think of yourself. We're so different. So very different."

He heard her intake of breath. She tilted her head, looking up at him. "We're not."

Immediate defiance, typical of her. It almost made him choke a laugh. But he couldn't. How could she believe he had anything good in his soul left?

Because she is a fool. Something he would prove to her when he seduced her, luring her into his bed for the express purpose of his own selfish pleasure, coupled with the satisfaction of causing his enemy pain. And then he would trade her.

She reached her hand up toward his rough cheek. "You are a good man. I know you are." Her eyes were luminous as she whispered, "Why do you do it, Robin? Why do you pretend to have no heart?"

Her gentle touch burned him. Suddenly, he couldn't bear it. He jerked his head away from her hand.

She stared at him in surprise. He was equally surprised. This was the same strange reaction his body had had last night.

Robin Locksley, who came from the gutter to where he was now, who had fought tycoons, ruthless despots and corrupt businessmen, had been rendered powerless by this beautiful, gentle hearted woman.

"Excuse me," he muttered, backing away. "I need to ...take a shower." He glanced down again at the table, at all the effort she'd clearly put into breakfast. She must have been up before dawn to arrange the flowers and cut the fruit, doing everything herself so that the housekeeper could be home with her sick child and working hard so that he, Robin, would not be disappointed or angry. "I'll be back," he choked out.

Fleeing to the bathroom, he took a very hot shower, but it did not help him relax. So he turned the temperature to freezing cold. But even an arctic blast of cold water couldn't stop this fire inside him. This fire inside her.

She was the first, the only, pure hearted woman he'd ever known. Who would give up their own sleep, to work for free in a place a stranger who claimed to have a sick child?

Robin didn't know anyone who would have done the same.

And yet Regina had immediately said, Yes, I want to help. Sick child? I'll do all your work. Go home to your little girl.

Robin leaned his head against the cool marble of the shower, then turned off the water. He got dressed in khaki shorts and a snug black t-shirt.

He threw a tortured glance toward the lanai where she waited. Yes, he was hungry. But not for food.

He took a deep breath. Could he ruthlessly seduce a woman like this, a woman with such a kind soul that she believed the best of everyone, even him? He would make sure she thoroughly enjoyed their affair. She would have nothing to regret.

And yet he knew she would. A woman like Regina didn't take lovers easily. She couldn't have done. She wasn't jaded enough. If he took her to bed, she wouldn't just give him her body, she might give him her heart.

But he wanted her. She would be with him for days, maybe longer. How would he keep himself from taking her? He didn't have any practice of resisting desire. This was the first time he'd ever tried not to seduce a woman. And he'd never felt a longing as powerful as this. Need for her gripped him, body and soul.

Squaring his shoulders, he went back out to the lanai. Regina looked at him, looking so innocent and fresh and pretty that a tremble went through him at the thought of defiling her.

"Coffee or tea?" she asked as she indicated a chair.

He fell heavily into the chair, "Coffee."

"Cream or...?"

"Black," he bit out.

She poured him a cup and he gulped it down, burning his tongue in the process.

The pain was a welcome distraction. He knew how to deal with pain. What he did not comprehend was how to deal with his desire for her.

"I'm sorry." she said.

"For what?"

She licked her lips, and he could not look away from the vision of her moist pink tongue sliding over her full lower lip, darting to the corner of her mouth. "For chasing you out of your bed last night."

He raked his hand through his wet hair, then shoved his coffee cup toward her on the table. "More," he growled. Then at her expression, he amended, "please."

She poured him another cup. She was the kind of woman, Robin thought, that any man would want to come home to. She was the kind of woman who made a home. Christ what was he thinking now? First he'd had images of her pregnant, how he was having ideas of coming home to her? He took another burning gulp of steaming hot coffee.

He was meant to be alone. He clenched his fingers over the china cup. He had been alone since his aunt had died when he was seventeen. He would always be alone. Hadn't he learned that by now?

An awkward silence fell between them. They only sound was the caw of seagulls and the pounding surf.

"So." She took a deep breath. "Have you heard from Leopold?"

"No," he bit out. It reminded him that now he would have to trade Regina to the bastard as planned, because he hadn't found Marian on his own. Once again, he'd been too late to reach her. Too late and too slow. And so he'd have to trade.

At the thought of giving Regina to any other man, Robin was so enraged he wanted to punch a wall. Instead, he shoved a piece of toast into his mouth.

"You must be hungry," she murmured, trying not to stare.

Robin wiped his mouth with his hand, staring back at her. At the pulse in her graceful neck. At the shape of her breasts beneath the thin eyelet cover up. At the curve of her slender waist. From this close space, he could smell the scent of her, like flowers and sunshine. Her hair was long and wavy. Natural. As if she'd just come from making love.

As if he'd ripped off her clothes and thrown her against the table, kissing her neck as he thrust deeply inside her.

He had to resist. For the first time since his mother had died, he had to do the right thing for someone else. He couldn't seduce a woman like Regina, knowing that it would ultimately hurt her, knowing he'd still be forced to trade her back to Blanchard like a used toy.

 _Not when he knew he was falling for her._

Where had that come from?

But still, even knowing he had to resist this pull towards her, his body shuddered with the effort it took not to seize her and take her.

"Blanchard is in Las Vegas. He will contact me as soon as the divorce is final," he ground out. "I expect within days."

She blinked. "A divorce can go through so fast? Even in Las Vegas?"

"An uncontested divorce in Vegas usually takes about two weeks. I'm using my influence to make it go more smoothly."

"How?"

"My people are persuading every office to make this case a priority and move it to the top of the pile. It's not difficult."

"Of course it's not, for you." Looking away she took a small sip of her coffee, holding the delicate cup with light grace. "You must be desperate to see her."

Desperate, was the right word, but he did not wish to be reminded of his latest failure. "And you?" he asked bitterly. "Are you desperate to be back in Blanchard's arms?"

She whirled back toward him, her beautiful eyes widening in shock. "You know I am not!"

He knew that, but Regina believed the best of people. Could she, in time, grow to forgive Blanchard as well? The thought made him cruel.

"You should know," he said brutally. "that you were not the first woman he took as a lover since his marriage."

She licked her lips. "I wasn't."

"He'd had five or six."

She set her coffee cup down on the table with a trembling hand. "You must think I'm the biggest idiot in the world," she whispered, blinking fast.

Staring at her, Robin abruptly grabbed both of her hands in his own. The sizzle of her soft touch, of her fingers against his rough palm, was torture. Ignoring the pain of his own longing, he looked into her beautiful face.

"You were the one he wanted to keep," his fingers tightened over hers as he whispered.

As if his touch burned her, she ripped her hands from his grasp, looking away.

"I didn't want to be kept," Regina said softly.

But Robin heard her, "So why marry him?"

Regina lowered her eyes from his, "To help my family. We would have lost everything, I love my mother and would do anything for her."

Robin moved his gaze from hers as her words brought back a memory for him.

Regina saw something on his expression and asked, "What happened to make you so hard and cynical?"

"It no longer matters," Robin said.

"You pretend that you have no heart and can't feel," Regina said, "but yet you say you love her."

Clenching his jaw, Robin looked at her. "I won't abandon her. I won't leave her to die alone and be forgotten. I can't. I won't."

He could see the questions in her eyes. Her body leaned toward him. But he wouldn't allow her to get any closer. His need for her already made him too vulnerable. He could not imagine what would happen if he wanted more than just her body. If he started wanting part of her heart. If he someday wanted to actually be the good man she thought he was.

Clenching his jaw, he looked down at her.

"Marian was barely eighteen when Blanchard married her in Vegas. They must have argued because she was driving back alone. My guess is that she'd already decided to leave him. Then she crashed in the desert." His hands tightened. "For a year, I've tried to find her. But I feel like I'm running out of time."

His voice cracked. He looked away.

Suddenly, he felt Regina's soft arms around him. She'd risen from her chair and now knelt before him, pulling him into her embrace without a word.

For a moment, he breathed in the scent of flowers and sunshine. He felt comforted. He felt safe, even protected. For the first time since his mother was still alive. Regina had incredible power over him, a strength he'd never seen before. She made him betray himself from within. She tempted him beyond measure.

She made him feel...like he was home.

With an intake of breath, he closed his eyes.

"Why not just pay off Leopold for Marian's return?"

His eyes flew open, "And reward him for what's he's done to her?"

Her eyes met his, "It would be the easiest thing to do."

"I do not care about easiest, I care about right. He will not receive a single euro from me. Ever," he bit out. "Not after he-" He stopped talking then.

"Just as I thought," she said with a tremulous smile. "A man of principle. But there's one small problem."

"And that is?"

She took a deep breath, "What if Leopold changed his mind about giving up everything for me?"

Robin reached out to stroke her cheek. "He won't. A man would do anything to possess a woman like you," he whispered. "He would betray his own soul."

She held her breath.

He started to lean toward her. Then he stopped himself, clenching his hands to his fists.

Abruptly, he rose to his feet. "I should go."

She grabbed his arm, "Stay."

"If I stay," he said in a low voice, "I will kiss you."

"I know."

He looked down at her harshly, "Do you know what you're asking me?"

"Yes." She looked up at him, her brown eyes full of light as she whispered, "I want you to kiss me."


	7. Chapter 7

_**(A/N-Special thanks to Bekki boo for beta reading this. As well as those who read, review, follow, fav.)**_

* * *

Regina heard his harsh intake of breath. It was all she could do to not release his arm. Heat suffused her cheeks at her bold words. But she'd said it. She'd actually said the thought that had been pounding in her heart all night as she lay alone in the large bed. The question that had built inside her all morning as she made breakfast.

She'd realized Robin would never go back on his word not to kiss her. If she wanted him, she would have to beg. He turned to her now, cradling her face in his strong hands as he looked down at her with such hot intensity that she felt lost in it.

"If I kiss you," he ground out,"it wont stop at a kiss."

"I don't want you to stop," Regina whispered. She didn't know what would happen, but all she did know was that if he didn't kiss her soon, she thought she would die.

"It will destroy your relationship with Blanchard forever," he said quietly.

Her eyes widened as she demanded,"Do you honestly think I care about that?"

"I hope not. I hope it like hell," Robin said roughly. Stroking her cheekbones, with the pads of his thumbs, he searched her gaze with his own. "But...I want you to understand. There would be no going back if we do this."

She could see the hunger in his blue eyes, hear the ragged edge of his voice. She could feel how much he wanted her with each stroke of his trembling fingertips against her skin. Shivers of longing curled down her body, to her earlobes, down her throat, to her breasts and other sensitive places deep inside her.

"Kiss me," she whispered. Closing her eyes, she waited, her lips parted. A warm wind blew against her skin over her thin white coverup.

She knew an affair between them could not last. But if she never found a man she could truly love, she didn't want to die without knowing a single instant of pleasure. She didn't need forever. She just needed today.

Now.

Or at least that was what she told herself with Robin so close to her that she could breathe his breath, that she could feel the warmth of his body against hers. She felt his thumb lightly trace her sensitized lower lip.

"The pain of his betrayal is still fresh in your heart," he said in a low voice. "You want to take revenge."

Right now, Leopold was the furthest thing from her mind. But opening her eyes, she saw his watchful, searching gaze. "Wouldn't you want revenge if someone betrayed you?"

"Yes," he said instantly. Then he shook his head, "But you're different. You care about people. You have a good heart. Committing an act of revenge would hurt you. And...I don't want to hurt you."

"You won't. You can't. I will never go back to him."

"You think that now," he said softly, stroking her cheek as he looked down at her with longing. "Christ, I can't believe I am trying to talk you out of this, but...you cannot have had many lovers. Forgive me, but you are not jaded enough. You would not have sex, like I do. When you go to bed with someone," he said lightly,"I fear you make love with all your heart."

She choked out a laugh."I have no idea. It's all still hypothetical.

Robin went very still. "What?"

This was humiliating. Her cheeks went red hot, but he had to know."You're going to laugh."

He did not look as if he were at all tempted to laugh. His blue eyes were wide. The lanai was utterly silent except for the sound of the seagulls flying over the beach. "What do you mean, you have no idea?"

"It will sound stupid to a man like you."

Uncertainty filled his blue eyes as he frowned, tilting his head."But Regina. You can't possibly mean..."

His voice trailed off. She took a deep breath and forced herself to speak the words out loud. "I'm a virgin."

He stared at her.

"But you cant be," he whispered. "You're the most beautiful woman I've ever seen."

"And it's even worse than that." She took a deep breath. "You're the first man who's ever really kissed me."

With a gasp, he grabbed her by the shoulders, searching for her eyes. His handsome face was a picture of shock. "No."

"That's why Leopold was going to have a fake wedding," she choked out. "Because I wouldn't kiss him. I barely let him peck my cheek. He knew I was saving myself for my wedding night."

"And now?" he demanded, his hands gripping her shoulders painfully.

She lifted her chin. "Now I want you to kiss me."

For a moment, he stared at her. Then he exhaled with a flare of nostrils. "Do not offer yourself to me out of revenge," he ground out. "Do not!"

"I'm not!" she denied hotly.

Robin looked down at her. "You told me you want a love that lasts forever. And it wouldn't be forever with someone like me. I'm not the sort of man you bring home to meet the parents, or to settle down with, or the man who'll marry you!"

"I don't care," she whispered out.

His hands tightened on her shoulders. "Don't you understand?" he said harshly. "I will still trade you."

"I know."

"So what the hell are you thinking?"

She took a deep breath.

"I'm tired of waiting," she whispered,"for a husband I can't find. A man who might not even exist. I want to know what it feels like to live. Here. Now." She faltered. "Unless...unless you don't want me after all."

Raking his hands through his hair, he cursed under his breath.

"You said you love Marian," she continued in a small voice. "Loving her, you might be too honorable to ever let a flirtation out of hand by betraying her-"

He grabbed her.

"I am not honorable," he bit out. "And you've got it all wrong. Marian is not my lover and she never was."

She sucked in her breath. "She's not?"

When he spoke, ever word was weighed and grudging, pulling from him like blood from a stone. "My feelings...for Marian are more...familial...in nature."

"Familial?" She sucked in her breath. "Like how?"

He didn't answer.

"Is she your cousin? Your niece?" She bit her lip. "Surely she's not young enough to be your...your daughter?"

Clenching his jaw, he looked away.

"You aren't going to tell me, are you?"

"No," he bit out.

"Because you promised her you wouldn't?"

He gave a single unsteady nod.

Familial. So she wasn't his mistress. She wasn't his lover. Marian was a member of his family, or at least that was how he felt toward her.

Regina's heart suddenly lightened. She took a deep breath. She looked up at him.

"You also promised," she said softly, reaching up to stroke his face, "that you would kiss me if I begged you."

Looking down at her, he sucked in his breath.

"I'm begging you." She let her hand slowly trail down his bare throat, placing her palm against his shirt, over the rapid beat of his heart. "Kiss me. Kiss me now."

She heard him gasp, then he grabbed her hands in his own. "All right," he rasped. His voice was raw. "All right."

"All right?"

"God help me-" He crushed his mouth against hers, hard and hungry. Cradling the back of her head, he shoved her against the wall, kissing her so deeply that she nearly gasped from the exquisite, anguished pleasure. She felt his hardness against her, felt his body so much stronger and more powerful than her own. But she was no longer afraid. She kissed him back, her hands gripping his hair as she gasped for breath, tilting back her throat.

He kissed her neck, his hands moving over her thin cover up, murmuring words of desire that she could not hear clearly, but she still heard them ringing through her body. Cupping her breasts with his hands, he bit the edge of her throat and shoulder, causing sparks of fire to spread down her body, making her shiver and shake.

With a ragged gasp, he pulled away, abruptly meeting her gaze. "You're cold."

Without waiting for a reply, he lifted her against his chest, carrying her from the shadows of the cool lanai, grabbing a huge throw as he walked out into the sun. She blinked at the intensity of the blinding light glaring off the white sand. He dropped the throw and then set her down on the warm sand of the beach, lying down beside her. She looked up at him, dazed with emotion and sensuality. His face was in shadow, his head haloed by the sun, bathed in golden light.

Lowering his head, he kissed her, covering her with his body. As he ran his hands over her thin cover up and the bare skin of her arms, she felt the weight body over hers and was suddenly flushed with heat. Leaning back on his haunches, he lifted his muscular arms and pulled off his tshirt. Dropping it to the sand, he reached for the belt of her cover up.

She put her hand over his. "No," she gasped. "We can't. Not out here."

"Here," he said.

"But-"

"This place is ours."

He kissed her, and his lips were so persuasive, moving against hers with aching sweetness of his tongue flicked against the corners of her lips, she could not deny him nothing. She meekly submitted to his demand, barely noticing as he undid the belt of her thin cotton cover up and pulled it off her body. His hands moved over her bikini, beneath the tiny squares of fabric, cupping her breasts, rolling her aching nipples between his fingers. Locking his eyes with hers, he reached for the strings of her bikini and pulled them open.

She realized she was naked before him, lying on the sand. The heat of his gaze was too intense, and as he reached for his own shorts she squeezed her eyes shut. She felt the hot sun against her naked body, the sprinkle of cool mist from the pounding surf. Then she felt his naked body over hers. He was so hard, so masculine, with muscular legs that were rough with coarse hair. His knee pushed between her thighs, separating them as he kissed her. SHe could feel him pressed between her legs, hard and huge, as he cupped her breasts with his hands. He suckled first one nipple, then the other, teasing with his tongue until she gasped with agonized pleasure.

Slowly, he kissed down her body. He licked her belly with tiny swirls of his tongue, flicking inside her belly button as he held her hips down with his large hands. He lowered himself farther down her body, spreading her thighs apart. Her pulse was a rush of blood in her ears, louder than the cries of seagulls or the waving fronds of palm trees sighing against the sky above. His breath was hot betwen her legs. It was shocking, but she could not fight it. Her body was his. Her head was spinning. She stretched her hands out on the sand, desperate to hold on to something,anything to keep her body from flying off the earth and into the sky. She felt his hands move on her skin between her thighs. He couldn't...

Spreading her wide, he took a long taste of her with the full width of his tongue.

With a gasp, she arched off the sand. The sensation of pleasure from this intimate, act was an assault of pleasure against her body. He moved in a swirling dance, working her most sensitive spot with his tongue. Lightly, then firmly, then lightly twisting again. Tension coiled deep inside her as her breath came in increasingly hoarse gasps. Her vision was going dark from the stars in her eyes.

"Look at me," he whispered.

She couldn't.

"Look at me," he demanded this time, and she had no choice but to obey.

The image of his head nestled between her thighs, looking up at her, as she saw his face against her naked body, caused a surge of electricity to sizzle through her body. Her hips lifted off the sand. Then he rose to his knees, and she for her first full look at his naked body.

Robin was breathtaking. Beautiful, in the strength of his muscled form and shape, as she looked down his hard bodied chest to his taut, flat belly and his lean hips. She saw the hard, enormous, jutting evidence of his desire for her and shut her eyes.

He covered her with his body, reaching across to gently brush tendrils of hair from her face. "Don't be afraid."

Regina kept her eyes shut. "I know it's going to hurt," she whispered. "Please just make it quick."

His low laugh made her eyes fly open. She founf him looking down at her with dancing blue eyes. "Oh, milady," he said. "Quick is the last thing I'm going to be. " As he slowly inched his way back down her body, she heard him mutter,"Even if it kills me."

He moved his head back between her legs and breathed against her. Holding her hips firmly, he pressed his mouth into the wet spot between her thighs. The pleasure was too intense, causing her hips to buck as she tried to jerk away, but he would not release her.

Feeling his tongue work her body like an instrument, playing her at his own rhythm, she was completely under his mastery and control. She could no nothig but surrender to a building joy of exquisite that it was agony as he tortured her with his sweet mouth, tossing her back and forth against the warm, white sand like a ship upon a raging sea. She heard the roar of the nearby surf as he suckled her taut center, licking and swirling her sensitive little nub.

Then when she didn't think his tongue could get any sweeter, he pushed his tongue inside her body.

She gasped as the jolt went through her. The feeling of his hard, wet tongue inside her was like nothing she'd ever felt before. She arched her back as his tongue moved upward, slowly savoring every slippery crevice of her body. He lapped her taut center and suddenly she felt his thick finger enter her slightly. Even as she gasped, he pulled his finger back. He was stretching her, filling her.

All the while, his hot tongue swirled incessantly against her sensitized nub, until the sensation was such sharp, sweet agony that she whimpered, begging for release, begging him to stop this torment. But he was merciless. Holding her firmly against the sane, he began to tease her, going from full laps of his tongue to tiny swirling licks with the tip that now tantalized, but didn't touch, the taut center of her longing. And when she could bear it no longer, when her gasping breath had shrunk her vision of the blue sky to small pinpricks in a sea of black, he suckled and bit her sensitive nub, bursting her into a thousand pieces, Regina screamed as her world exploded.

Instantly he lifted his mouth from her, shoving her legs apart with his hips, positioning his hardness between her thighs. She was still gasping for breath, lost in dazed ecstasy, when she felt his hardened cock pressing against her wet core, demanding entrance. With a ragged breath, he pushed himself inside her with one relentless movement.

She was unprepared for the shock of pain, unready for the enormous size of him entering her virgin entrance, as he pushed inside her. She choked back a cry. He froze, holding himself utterly still.

Then slowly, as she exhaled, he began to move inside her. Gently, ever so gently, he swayed his hips against her, rocking back and forth as he thrust with agonizing slowness inside her. To her surprise, a new wave of pleasure begin to build, coiling low in her belly. A new shot of esctasy swept her up almost instantly as he filled her so deeply and completely, all the way to her heart.

Deeper. _Deeper._ His force split her in two but the pain had somehow turned into hot, molten pleasure. It built so hard and fast that within minutes, she gasped out his name as she felt a second explosion, even deeper and more shattering than the first, and she screamed. His deep, low voice joined her, shouting out his own pleasure with a growl of ecstasy, and she felt tears on her cheeks and realized she was weeping with joy.

After Robin collapsed over her sweet naked body, it took a long time before he slowly came back to his senses. Eventually, he felt the hot sun on his back. He looked down at the beautiful woman in his arms. Her eyes were closed, her lips curved in a smile. His heart turned over in his chest.

He'd never felt anything like this. Ever. For anyone.

He'd never even imagined lovemaking could feel like this. Was it because he'd never been with a virgin before? Was that why he felt such amazement, such tenderness?

It had nearly killed him to hold back as he'd made love to her. But knowing this was her first time, he'd wanted to make it good for her. And what she'd done for him...the way she'd made him feel...

Tenderly, he rolled off her body so he wouldn't crush her with his weight. He'd wanted nothing more than to make love to her like this, on the white sand as the waves crashed beneath the palm trees. He'd wanted to fill her, impale her, to make her sccream out his name. But it hadn't been like he'd imagined. It had been better. It had been the single most amazing sexual experience of his life.

Tucking his hand behind his head, he stared up at the wispy white clouds drifting over the blue sky. Then he glanced at the beautiful woman in his arms, and realized to his shock that he already wanted more of her. And it was even more shocking than that.

He realied in that moment that he didn't want to give her up. Ever.

He wanted to possess her forever.


	8. Chapter 8

_**(A/N-Special thanks to Bekki boo for beta reading this. And thanks to those who read, review, follow, fav.)**_

* * *

The next morning, Regina lay cradled against him in the large bed as she stared out the bedroom window, watching the pink streaks of sunrise cross the sky. They'd moved into the bedroom sometime yesterday afternoon. They'd spent the rest of the night there, only leaving the bed to shower and scavenge and devour simple meals in the kitchen.

She looked at him now as he slept. His peaceful face looked younger somehow, almost boyish. Sleeping with him all night, in his arms after the many times they'd made love, was utter bliss. It was blissful.

It was torture.

Why did she feel this way, so completely infatuated, so enamored, so connected to him in every way possible? Was it because he was her first lover? Was she deluding herself, like she had with Leopold, into imagining Robin as the fulfillment of some romantic dream?

"Don't think I'm a good person," he'd told her grimly. She didn't want to believe him. How could she when every inch of her body down to blood and bone insisted differently? And Robin had kept every promise he'd made to her. Even last night, when she'd practically thrown herself at him, he'd actually tried to let her go, to warn her off. She was the one who'd called him on his promise, demanding that he kiss her. Giving him her virginity had been entirely her choice.

She didn't regret it. She couldn't.

And yet...

She'd told herself she could just have casual sex, that she could experience sensual pleasure without falling in love. Now, she realized how foolish she had truly been to think she could ever keep her heart separate from her body. She did not have the walls of armor that men had. That Robin had.

"No regrets?" he said quietly beside her, as if he'd read her mind.

She turned to him with an unsteady smile. "None," she lied, her heart in her throat. "In fact, I was just thinking I should have jumped into bed with some man a long time ago."

He growled. "I am glad you did not."

Leaning forward, he kissed her. His embrace was tender, making her heart yearn and twist and break beneath the pleasure.

He pulled back, his dark brows lowered in concern as he searched her gaze. "What's wrong, Regina?" he said quietly. "Are you thinking of Blanchard?"

"No."

"You love him?'

"No!" she shook her head fiercely. "I could never love someone like him."

He looked at her, his blue eyes shining. "I am glad."

Their eyes locked, and for a moment, she was utterly lost. But she couldn't fall in love with Robin after he'd specifically warned her not to! She couldn't be that stupid, that gullible and naive.

Abruptly, she sat up in bed.

"Regina?"

"I'm fine." She smiled back at him, but it took an effort. She blinked fast to hide threatening tears. "I'm great. We had a fun night together. It's no big deal."

"It was your first time," he said softly, putting his hands below his head on the pillow. He smiled, his eyes caressing her. "Of course it's a big deal."

"Well, you needn't worry." She looked away. "I'm not going to pester you for an engagement ring."

"That's good," he said with a snort. "We both know I am not the sort of man for you to bring home to your parents. I'm not exactly husband and father material."

"Right."

"I mean it." He sat up beside her, his eyes suddenly serious. "You think Leopold is a selfish bastard? I am worse."

She looked away. "So you say."

"I'm no good to any woman," he insisted. "Least of all a woman like you, Regina..." Reaching out, he took her hands in his larger ones. "You deserve the fairy tale. And we both know I am no white knight."

She pulled her hands away.

"Honestly, you don't need to explain." Her voice crackled. "I'm fine. In a few days, you can trade me and I'll go back home and find a man I can truly love. Someone who's honorable, kind and strong. A man I can love for the rest of my life."

Silence fell between them.

"And if he never comes?" Robin said quietly.

The thought caused pain in her throat. "Then I'll be alone," she whispered. "Until the day that I die."

"That won't happen." He pulled her back into his arms. She tried to resist, but he was inexorable. He held her against his naked chest for long moments, as they watched the sky outside grow bluer and bright. "You will have a happy life. You won't be doomed to suffer. There's a bright future for you around every turn, even if you miss one. "

Still cradled against his chest, she looked back at him. Their eyes locked as, with agonizing slowness, he lowered his mouth to hers.

"You deserve everything good in this world," he whispered against her skin. She felt his hands stroking her, felt his fingers twisting in her tangled hair before he kissed her. After the intense passion of the previous night, he was gentle now, tender against her bruised lips. His kiss was so poignant and sweet that tears burned her eyes. She felt choked with emotion.

Why did her heart ache like this? Was it just the overflow of too much passion, too much joy in his arms? Or was it the pain of knowing it would not last?

His kiss deepened. Rolling back on the mattress, he lifted her over him, stroking her naked back, making her shiver in the cool dawn. Looking down at him beneath her on the bed, Regina thought she'd never seen a man at once so beautiful and brutal. His jaw was rough and he had scruff, his short hair mussed from all their hours of lovemaking. His body was tanned and muscular, from his broad shoulders to his taut belly to his thighs. Robin was like no man she'd ever met. If he wasn't a white knight, then he was the dark prince of midnight dreams.

He left her breathless. His strength. His power. Most of all, the dark heat of his eyes as he looked up at her. His hands lifted up her hips. As if she weighed nothing at all, he lowered her with exquisite slowness, impaling her, causing them to both gasp as he filled her inch by ever so delicious inch. Regina tossed back her head, exposing her neck as her eyes rolled back with the pleasure. He guided her, allowing her to establish her own rhythm, teaching her to ride him. Tension coiled inside her deep and fast, and when she finally exploded, she screamed. He plunged inside her with a deep thrust, shouting her name with a boorish growl that somehow sounded like a prayer. When she collapsed over his body, utterly spent, it took ten minutes before she stopped shaking.

Afterward, as they slept in each other's arms, Regina opened her eyes to stare blankly at the brilliant sunlight on the ocean.

She could no longer deny her feelings.

Robin had seen her at her worst. And he'd accepted her, just as she was. Perhaps because he accepted himself. He knew he wasn't perfect, so she didn't need to be, either. They could both have faults, but still be...friends.

Friends?

Friendship did not describe the longing of her heart.

But what she felt could only bring pain. Even if Robin cared about her, he would still trade her for Marian. In a heartbeat.

"My feelings for Marian are more familial in nature," he said. Could she be his cousin? His niece? The daughter of an old friend? Who? Regina wished she knew.

But one thing she did know for sure, Robin Locksley kept his promises. And in spite of his best warnings, when she'd given him her body, she'd also given him her heart.

Outside, the sunshine was brilliant and bright, and the morning birds sang sweetly in the blue sky. And Regina silently wept in his arms as he slept. She was in love with Robin. And she knew there was only one way it could end. With her own broken heart.

Robin was awakened from a very pleasant dream by a persistent buzzing and rattling sound against the hard tile floor. Blearily, he opened his eyes and saw his cell phone vibrating in his shorts pocket next to the bed. He glanced at Regina, hoping it hadn't woken her. It hadn't. A smile traced his lips at how peacefully she slept, his mischievous beauty.

Careful not to jostle her, they'd gotten so little sleep, it would be cruel to wake her for anything but sex, he climbed out of bed and carried the phone outside the bedroom, closing the door softly behind him.

"Locksley."

"This time we've found her, boss," his chief bodyguard said tersely. "Martin is sure."

Ten minutes later, Robin had showered and was dressed. He returned to the bedroom filled with nervous energy. His hand reached out to shake Regina's shoulder and awaken her, then he paused, looking down at her.

He could still hardly believe she'd been a virgin before yesterday. And that she'd deliberately chosen him, of all men on earth, to be her first lover. He shivered, remembering all the times they'd made love in the last twenty four hours. He should have been satiated, but looking at her now, he very nearly forgot his mission and climbed back into bed.

Then he stopped himself, No. He had a lead on Marian and he couldn't blow this opportunity. He had to focus. If he could find Marian, he could save her.

And then he could keep Regina for himself.

If he could really be that selfish to keep her, knowing she would be better off with a better man, instead of with a ruthless, heartless bastard like him.

Robin looked down at her, and his whole body hardened. Yes, he thought grimly. He could be that selfish. At this moment, he would kill any man who tried to take her away from him. Reaching out, he lightly shook Regina's shoulder. "Wake up," he said in a low voice. "We need to go."

"Go?" She yawned, stretching her body across the bed, from her hands to her toes. "Go where?"

The sheet had fallen from her body, leaving her upper body bare. His back broke out in a hot sweat at the sight of those lusciously full breasts, the pink tips that he'd suckled just hours before, cupping them in his hands as he...Robin shuddered.

Forcefully, he made himself look away from her, before he forgot such minor details like promises and honor and jumped into bed with her for another twenty four hours. Clenching his hands into fists, he forced himself not to touch her, to have some self-control. "Mexico."

"Mexico?" She sounded bewildered. "Why? Do you have business there?"

He cleared his throat, unwilling to explain. "In a manner of speaking. Get dressed. My assistant is already packing for you."

"Packing what? You only gave me bikinis," she said.

"I might have sent away for more clothes."

"When was that?"

"A few hours after we arrived."

"Why didn't you tell me?" Her furious voice ended with a squeak that made her grin. He almost turned to look at her, then stopped himself just in time before he got another image of her sprawled naked across the bed. Christ, he only had so much willpower, he was only a man! He hurried to the door. "The suitcase is still packed beneath the bed. We leave in ten minutes."

But once again, his foolish hopes of finding Marian proved destined for failure. As soon as their jet arrived in Cabo San Lucas, he dropped Regina off without explanation at a luxury gated villa in the hills. He drove with bodyguards in an open Jeep, going north of a dirt road to the little desert village in Baja California.

At a shabby little casita, he knocked on the door. Robin heard a woman's low moan inside and adrenaline ripped through his body. Shouting Marian's name, he kicked open the door. He found a woman lying on a small bed, a brunette Marian's size with bandages on her face. For a moment, he'd believed that after all these months, he'd finally found her.

Then he'd heard the language the woman was shouting. German? It turned out she was a wealthy businesswoman from Berlin who'd come to recover from her face lift in privacy and seclusion. Robin had only convinced her not to call the police through substantial cash compensation.

Later they drove back to Cabo San Lucas in silence. Entering the villa, Robin felt hollowed out. He walked through the heavily embellished oak door with his shoulders hunched. Wearily, he pushed open the door, and the hinges squealed like the nails on a chalkboard, the harsh noise scraping his soul.

His mind was on one thing.

He failed Marian again.


	9. Chapter 9

_**(A/N-Special thanks to Bekki boo for beta reading this story. As well as those who read, review, follow, fav.)**_

* * *

At that moment, when his soul felt empty, he heard a miracle that soothed the pain in his heart. Regina's sweet, clear voice.

"I'm glad you're back."

Slowly, he looked up. What he saw took his breath away.

Regina stood in front of the wide sunlit veranda overlooking the Pacific, looking fresh and pretty in a new sleeveless pink dress, her dark hair tumbling down her shoulders. He exhaled. Everything good in the world seemed wrapped up in her.

She saw his bleak expression and her dark eyes widened. She didn't ask any questions. She just held out her arms. Without a word, he went to her. He nearly choked out a sob when he felt her soft arms go around him. It reminded him of all the times his mother had held him, especially after his father had died of a stroke. But he held it inside. A man didn't cry. He'd learned that long ago. But there were other things a man could do.

He led her through the villa, with its soaring ceiling and colonial style architecture. He turned on the shower, and the hot steam filled the room. Without a word, he turned to Regina and slowly unbuttoned her dress.

She did not resist. She stood before him, watching him with her heart on her expressive face. He pulled off her clothes, dropping her dress, her bra, her panties to the clay tile floor. She then pulled off his clothes. Taking her hand, he pulled her into the enormous shower. The hot water burned him, washing off the dust and grime and sorrow. He looked down at Regina. Her petite, curvaceous body was naked, her lustrous skin pink with the heat of the steam. Tilting her head back with his hand, he washed her hair.

She submitted without a word, without complaint, without demands. Her silent sympathy healed his wounded soul as nothing else had. As nothing else could.

Turning her around, he held her against the glass wall of the shower and lowered his mouth to hers in a hard, demanding kiss. When she returned his embrace, he did not wait. He lifted her legs around his waist. Without warning or permission, he took her as his own, thrusting deep inside of her, holding her against the shower wall.

Regina could feel herself clenching his cock, and she could feel an ache beginning between her legs, a pleasurable throbbing. Each time Robin thrust into her, he could feel her muscles flexing around his cock, stroking his length as he pushed into her and withdrew again. Robin heard her ragged breath and her moans when he thrust into her and egged her on in his mind, not noticing that he was thrusting even harder. She began panting and he felt her vagina squeeze his cock even harder. Regina thrust herself as hard as she could, the smoldering ache was at it's peak inside her vagina and her swollen clit kept bumping on his pelvis adding to the ache and drawing it to an even higher peak, she thrusted at him one more time taking him into her as deep as she could and there was a sudden release of pleasure.

"Oh God!" Regina said. Her body jerking with pleasure. Robin grunted and she could feel him spurt inside her. His cum was hot, as they both felt the pulsing aftershocks from both his cock and her vagina. Hot water continued to pour over their bodies as they enjoyed the aftermath.

Afterward, he took her to the bed and made love to her again, this time with tenderness, bringing her to gasping fulfillment that made her almost weep tears of joy. Who was this woman? And what power did she have over him? He thought as he held her to his chest. Who was this woman who could offer him her sympathy, her body, her heart, without making any demands of her own?

He should have known it wouldn't last.

Later that night, as they were served dinner by the rented villa's housekeeper, Regina suddenly looked up at him in the candlelight. The two of them were sitting together at the end of a long table, in front of the wall of windows with a view of the moonlit Pacific and the Gulf of Cortez. He could see an old fishing boat with hanging lights, and in the distance an enormous cruise ship. Mariachi music from the resort town below drifted up the hillside through the open windows.

Regina took a bracing gulp of a lime margarita, then leaned forward over the table. The candlelight cast shadows on her face, giving her the beautiful, concerned expression of a Renaissance Madonna as she asked quietly, "Why have we been traveling so much? Has Leopold called the police? Has he been chasing us?"

Robin snorted. "Leopold would never call the police. That would just reveal his own crimes. He's still in Las Vegas, settling the divorce."

"Then why?" She pressed her lips together. "It must be your business making such demands," she said softly. She shook her head. "It must exhaust you."

He wanted to explain to her that it wasn't his business, just his failure to find Marian that kept them constantly on the move, but the words choked in his throat. He couldn't bear Regina's sympathy now, on top of everything else. If she tried to smile and tell him consolingly that he was still a good man and no doubt trying his best, or that it wasn't his fault, he would smash the wall with his fist.

When he did not reply, she looked down at her plate. She took another bite of her enchiladas de mariscos. Waving her fort, she tilted her head at him, her eyes gleaming. "I know you're rich and powerful and all," she teased, clearly trying to elevate the mood, "but what exactly do you do, anyway?"

Robin served himself more of the enchiladas and fish tacos that the villa cook had prepared. "I buy distressed companies. I sell the divisions that are profitable. I discard the parts that are not."

Her face closed down. "Oh."

He blinked at her. "You don't approve?"

She shook her head.

"Why?" he asked curiously.

She shrugged.

"Tell me," he wanted her thoughts.

She sighed, "Look, I know I don't have any right to criticize. You're a millionaire with a private jet and I'm a child care worker with fifty dollars in my bank account. But I've been working my way through college, studying to become a teacher," she hesitated, biting her lip, as if she expected him to mock her.

He leaned forward in his chair, "Go on."

"Your company seems profitable, and that's great, but..."

"Yes?" he encouraged her to continue.

She pressed her lips together, then looked up. "But people work at those companies. People who lose their jobs."

"Yes?"

There was a loud burst of mariachi music from the town below, and she looked in the distance at the dark, moon swept Pacific. "I'm biased, I guess. My grandfather had a textile mill that he left to my father. It did really well, then things fell apart after my father's health went bad. He had been offered to sell his company. It would have made us wealthy, but my dad knew they'd close the factory and move production, leaving half our town out of work. So for the sake of his employees, his neighbors and friends, my father refused."

"Foolish."

"No, not foolish!" she retorted. "It was noble. Courageous, even. My dad said we would either all sink together, or he would find a way to make the company succeed."

"And what happened?"

She looked down at her hands in her lap. "In spite of all his best efforts, the company went bankrupt."

Robin gave a single nod. "He never should have allowed his feelings to override his business judgment."

"He was protecting his employees!"

"He didn't protect them. He failed them. And worse, he failed you. If he'd sold the company, you wouldn't be working your way through college now."

She glared at him. "My father did the right thing. He held up to his principles. I thought you of all people would appreciate that."

"I of all people believe in facing reality. The company was a business. Not a charitable institution."

"You sound so harsh!"

"That is how business works," he said evenly, dipping his taco chips into his shrimp ceviche and fresh guacamole. "Things that were once successful die, they get replaced by the new. Business."

"It doesn't have to be that way." She bit her lip, then said in a rush. "Someday, I'll start it up again. I've made up a business plan. I'll find a way to open that factory and-"

"Forget it," he said brutally. "Accept it's over and move on."

She looked away, trembling. She took a gulp of lime margarita, then set the glass back down on the table. "It's easy for you to say, isn't it? You just break companies up for parts. Dissecting and eating them like a vulture."

"It's profitable."

"You would have no clue how to truly run a company, to love it and invest your heart and soul in it."

"You're right," he said. "And I wouldn't want to. I don't want it to be personal. It's business."

"Nothing's ever personal for you, is it?" Putting her hands on the table, she pushed herself to her feet. "I feel sorry for you. I do."

If it had been anyone else, he would have shrugged off their criticism and let them leave, but not Regina. She was the one person he couldn't stand to be angry at him.

He reached his hand over hers. "I'm sorry," he said softly. "I don't wish to fight with you."

Her eyes relented. "I don't want to fight, either." She licked her lips and said, "But if you could just see how much greater it could be, how much more satisfying and challenging, to actually create something of value, anything-"

"No," he said. "Even if I could do it, I wouldn't. It would be a waste of energy and money." He rose to his feet. "You've been cooped up in this penthouse all day. Shall we go out?"

"Out?" she said in astonishment.

He shrugged, even as his eyes caressed her. "I hear music from town. Want to go dancing with me?"

She sucked in her breath. "You would let me go out in public? You'd trust me not to run to the police?"

"If you give me your word you won't, I'll trust you."

"I give you my word," she said, then paused. "Anyway, I want to help Marian now. I want to help you."

Of course she did, Robin thought, his eyes searching her sweet, beautiful face as if memorizing it for eternity. He'd kidnapped her, seduced her, refused to answer her questions. And yet she wanted to help him. Regina had the most loving heart of any woman, since his own mother.

She bit her lip again, her face suddenly drawn. "But when do you think Leopold will finalize the divorce?"

Robin didn't want to think about it. "Any day now."

She looked sad, then brightened. "But we have tonight. And I can hardly believe how much I've seen of the world in such a short time," she said as she wrapped a pale cashmere cardigan around her shoulders.

"You haven't minded all the travel?"

"No, I haven't," she answered. "I love and miss my home though."

"That's what I can imagine."

"What?"

"Having a home that I didn't wish to leave?"

"You never had a home?"

He didn't like the pity in her eyes. "I haven't needed one." He looked down at her. But you make everywhere feel like home to me, he thought. All he said was,"I've enjoyed our time together as well."

"I thought you hated me at first," she said teasingly as he escorted her from the villa toward his rented MG convertible. "When you left it up to me to decide if we would even kiss..."

As he opened her door, he said, "I always knew I would get you into my bed."

She froze, then looked back at him. "You did?"

He suddenly wanted to tell her the truth. Had to tell her the truth. "I seduced you deliberately, Regina."

"Oh." Looking dazed, she climbed into the convertible and he closed the door behind her. Climbing into the driver's side, he drove them out of the gated community down the winding hillside toward town. She remained silent for a few moments. Then he looked at her.

"Now do you regret it?" he asked quietly.

"No." She turned away. "It's just..."

"Just?"

"When I meet the man I marry," she said in a small voice, "what if he asks me why I didn't have faith?"

"Regina," he growled.

"I waited so long. The only man who seemed remotely like a prince, turned out to be a massive frog," Regina said.

Robin looked at her and envied, no hated, the man she would someday marry. "He won't ask you any stupid questions like that. He'll just get down on his knees and thank God you are his wife."

She gave him an undecided look.

He found a parking spot near the marina. Turning off the car engine, he turned to face her beneath the warm lights of the town and took her hands in his own.

"I wonder if you have any idea how truly rare you are," he said. "How you make life beautiful wherever you go. To everyone around you. Even me."

She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. He saw the emotion on her face, but her voice seemed purposefully light as she said, "Well, you were a hard case."

He snorted a laugh, but as he leaned forward to kiss her, his phone rung. He was still smiling when he answered, "Locksley."

"We're divorced."

Blanchard's voice was full of repressed fury.

Robin turned away from Regina, speaking in a low voice. "What?"

"You heard me."

"The filing is complete?"

"Yes. I've used your connections to push it through. Tomorrow morning, it will be registered as final."

"Then call me tomorrow," Robin said shortly, but his eyes traced over Regina, who was watching him with big eyes. Tomorrow. He would have to give her up so soon?

"Wait, I want to talk to Regina," Leopold said.

"No."

"Her coworker called and said her mother has had a heart attack and they don't know if she'll make it. You have to let me take Regina home."

"You think I'll fall for that?" Robin said with a snort.

"Have a heart, you bastard. It's her family."

Robin looked at Regina's face, so sweet and trusting. Family meant everything to her.

His jaw hardened. "I don't have a heart, Blanchard," he replied coldly. "You should know that by now, more than anyone."

"Was it Leopold?" Regina asked after he'd hung up.

He gave a grim nod.

"And?"

"The divorce will be final in the morning."

"Oh." She said in a small voice. He saw the tremble of her delicate throat as she said, "So tonight's our last night."

They'd both known, all along, that their affair would soon end. What he hadn't realized was how completely and utterly he would hate the thought of ever letting her go. He gave a single unsteady nod.

"You'd still trade me," she whispered. "Won't you?"

He'd made a promise. He had no choice. "Yes."

She gave him a trembling smile. "Then tonight is a celebration, I guess. Tomorrow, we'll both get what we want. I'll go home to my family, and you'll get Marian back."

Staring at her, Robin set his jaw. He abruptly turned away, dialing his phone and speaking into it rapidly. When he hung up his phone, his suspicions had been confirmed. Blanchard hadn't lied.

"Where shall we go first?" Regina said, visibly forcing a smile. "Shall we go dancing, as you said?"

"The airport."

"Why?" She sucked in her breath, "We can't even have one last night?"

"I'm taking you home," he said quietly.

"Why there?"

Looking down at her, he placed his hands gently over hers. "You're going to need to be strong, Regina. I have some bad news. Your mother's had a heart attack."

Regina gasped, falling back against her seat. He grabbed her, cradling her against his chest.

"I'll get her the best care, Regina," he vowed. "She'll be all right. I promise you."

She stared at him, her brow furrowed. Then she embraced him in a flood of tears. "Thank you."

Robin held her to his chest, stroking her back, murmuring words of nonsensical comfort. All he could think about was that he would do anything, absolutely anything, to make her mother well. Anything to make Regina happy.

When she finally pulled away to look up at him, tears were streaming down her face. "Why are you being so good to us?" she whispered. "You don't even know her."

"No," Robin said quietly. Looking down at her, he stroked her beautiful face and felt a lump in his throat as he said. "But I know you love her. That's all I need to know."


	10. Chapter 10

_**(A/N-Special thanks to Bekki boo for beta reading this. And to those who read, review, follow, fav.)**_

* * *

It was almost another twenty four hours before Regina finally collapsed into her own bed. Trembling with exhaustion, clasping the same pink cardigan she'd worn in Mexico more tightly over her arms, she sank down on her bed. She was home. Nothing had changed and yet Regina looked at Robin's form looking at her from the doorway. A few of her distant family members were downstairs, including her father's dear sister and her grandchildren.

Her mother was getting better and she had come home for the time being. Robin had brought her home to rest. She looked up at him, "Thank you."

Blinking, he glanced back at her. "For what?"

"For bringing me back and everything you did for my mother," Regina answered.

He shrugged, "I did nothing."

"You're wrong," she said softly. "You brought me home."

He gave her a wry smile. "Your mother didn't know whether to hug me or slap me, did she?"

When they'd arrived a few hours earlier, Robin had already summoned the top cardiologist to meet them at the hospital. The doctor had run tests on her mother's heart and confirmed it hadn't been an actual attack, but an 'episode' that was no lasting cause for concern, as long as Cora didn't over exert herself.

Cora had stubbornly told them it was because of the worry about Regina being gone.

And no wonder. Regina had discovered that Leopold had explained her disappearance by telling them Regina was a runaway bride who'd changed her mind and couldn't be bothered to contact her family. That was his big explanation!

Regina growled. If she hadn't hated Leopold before, she'd have certainly hated him now. Rather than admit any of his own guilt, he'd left Regina in the position of having to explain to her mother, who was still in the hospital for observation, at the cardiologist's insistence, why Regina had disappeared for days on her wedding day, only to reappear here today with another man on her arm.

Thank heaven for Robin. He'd been her rock through all of this. Looking up now at the set of his jaw, at the hard lines of his handsome face as he moved and stared out the window of her bedroom, Regina blinked back tears. When she'd tried to explain to her family what had happened, she floundered helplessly.

Then Robin had stepped in. He'd gently explained to her mother that Leopold had lied, that he'd never been free to wed and that he, Robin, had kidnapped Regina from her own wedding to force him to admit he already had a wife. Robin had quietly faced down her family's wrath and blame, and told them he was sorry. He'd been kind and courteous.

The only thing he hadn't told them was that he and Regina had become lovers. Which, in this family, was probably for the best.

Now he was in Regina's bedroom. This handsome, powerful man, who'd been so good to her family. This devastatingly strong man who'd moved heaven and earth to bring Regina home in record time. This ruthless man who she knew had a good heart, no matter how he might try to hide it. This man she loved.

Looking at his figure in front of the window, she suddenly trembled in a way that had nothing to do with exhaustion.

"Why did you bring me home?" She rose slowly to her feet. "The local sheriff is a friend of the family. He lives just down the street."

He stared at her, and for the first time she noticed the dark circles under his eyes. "If you want to escape, or have me arrested, I know I cannot stop you now."

"So why did you do it? Why risk bringing me back here, when you knew you might lose me as a bargaining chip to get Marian, or worse?"

He looked down at the floor. "Because your family means everything to you." He smiled to himself. "I had forgotten how a family could be."

"Was your childhood so different?"

His jaw clenched as he turned back to the windows. "For a while I had a real family, my parents loved one another. Then my father was falsely accused by a greedy investor. He stole from the company and lied that it was my father who did it. The stress made my father have a heart attack and die. My mother tried her best to take care of us, as I tried to help out as well. I sold everything I had to try to help my mother clothe and feed us. It was no use though, she caught a very bad cold and lingered on for a year and also died."

"Oh, Robin, I'm so sorry," Regina said as she stared at him, pain cutting around her heart. She thought of the little boy, orphaned by his parent's deaths.

"I swore to make the bastard who tore my family apart, pay," Robin said as he looked at her.

Regina saw something in Robin's eyes, and suddenly knew, "It was Leopold wasn't it?"

He didn't answer, he didn't have to.

Regina's heart was in her throat. Coming behind him, she wrapped her arms around him, pressing her cheek to his back. "I'm sorry."

"Now you know what I am," he said in a low voice. "Now you know why you'd be a fool to love me. Even you. Especially you."

 _But I do_ , she thought, her heart aching in her chest _. I do love you._

Her lips parted to speak the words, but at that moment her bedroom door was pushed open with a loud squeak. Her aunt stood in the doorway, Hannah Rhodes took one look at the couple and put her hands on her hips.

"Now, you two," she said warningly. She turned to Robin with a greater show of warmth. "Mr. Locksley-"

"Robin," he corrected her with a smile.

"Robin, we've set you up for the night in a guest room down the hall. I'll show you," Hannah glanced between them sharply. "But there'll be no funny business tonight. I mean it."

"Of course not, ma'am," Robin said meekly. He looked at Regina, and his blue eyes danced with sudden laughter. Then he sobered. "Get some sleep, Regina. We leave for Las Vegas in the morning, if your mother is still holding her own."

As the door closed, Regina sucked in her breath. In the morning. The trade.

Pushing the painful reminder away, Regina stared at the closed door as she changed into some pajamas. She called a co-worker first to see how little Henry was doing, she was relieved that he was doing well. She thought back to how Robin seemed to fit in with her family in a way like nothing she had seen.

"Regina," Hannah said from the doorway with a cup of peppermint tea. She handed it to Regina and took a seat beside her.

"I always hoped when you finally settled down, you would bring home a man who's just regular folk, like us." She paused. "A man like the one who's sleeping right now down the hall."

Regina nearly snorted peppermint tea out of her nose hearing Robin Locksley, the international millionaire, described by her aunt as regular folk.

"Anyway, I'm thankful your mother is better." Her aunt rose from the bed with a tender smile. "And you're home. Everything will work out now." She paused at the door, her hands on her hips as she swiveled around, her eyes narrowed. "But I meant what I said, no funny business under my nose."

Regina went to the hall bathroom, and after brushing her teeth, she paused at his closed door. Tomorrow, she would tell him that she loved him before they reached Las Vegas. Tomorrow, before he traded her for Marian and her chance was lost, forever.

Regina had a miracle of a family. Of her mother who was getting better. Having Robin love her back would be too much to ask. But tomorrow, Regina would take her courage in her hands and do it.

Robin heard a knock on his door.

Regina.

She'd come to him, in spite of her aunt's warning. With an intake of breath, he hurried from the bed and reached for the door. Then he stopped. He knew what would happen if he invited her into his bedroom. He knew. Making love to Regina was all he could think about. He felt enveloped in love. And he knew it wasn't just the house.

It was Regina. She loved him.

She hadn't spoken the words. But he'd been able to see it on her beautiful face. She'd never learned to lie. Her expressive eyes were an open book for him to read. She'd seen him at his worst, she knew what he'd done, and yet she loved him. How was it possible?

Clenching his hands into fists, Robin took a deep breath. He heard her waiting on the other side of the door, waiting for him to open it and let her in. It was like agony, knowing she was there and still doing nothing. Finally, he heard her give up and her footsteps disappear down the hall.

He exhaled. Closing his eyes, he leaned back against the door.

He wanted her. Now more than ever.

But it was more than that. It had become far more than lust. More an admiration. More even than respect.

She was the most loving woman he'd ever met. Honest. Sweet. Kind. Brave. She was the kind of woman who could make any man, even him, become decent and true, just by the effect of her presence.

He loved her.

His body straightened, his eyes opened, wide with shock.

He was in love with her.

Robin, a man who had nothing in this world but money and power, nothing of value, had fallen in love with a woman who made everything glorious and new. The most precious, adorable, passionate woman in the world.

He wasn't remotely worthy of her. And yet he ached to be. He ached to take her in his arms, to tell her he loved her, to make her his wife and treasure her forever. Eagerly, he grabbed the door handle.

Then he froze.

He loved her. But he'd made a promise to trade her. A promise that would save Marian.

He'd made a promise. He had no choice.

But Regina did.

Going back to the window, he swung the led paned glass open and took a deep breath of the cold night air. For once in his life, he would give himself up to someone else's control. To Regina's. The truth was, he admitted quietly to himself, the power had always been hers.

He stared at the moonlight. From the moment they'd met, he'd thought he'd been the one in control. He'd been her captor, she'd been his prisoner. But she had always been the more powerful one, though neither of them had realized it. And tomorrow, she would decide his fate.

Reaching for his phone, he dialed. The first number was to his lawyer. The second was a hated number he knew by heart.

"Blanchard," he said. "I'm ready to trade."


	11. Chapter 11

_**(A/N-Special thanks to Bekki boo for beta reading this. And to those who read, review, follow, fav.)**_

* * *

The next day, they were on their way to the airport. Regina wore a black dress, appropriate for either a death in the family or for any woman being traded away like a used car. She glanced for the tenth time at Robin sitting beside her in the backseat of the black SUV. He continued to ignore her. Half an hour ago, the SUV had roared in front of the house. Six bodyguards in dark suits had poured out as a uniformed chauffeur opened the door for Robin. Her aunt's jaw had dropped. So much for regular folk!

Today, Regina thought, giving him another nervous side glance. Today, she would tell him she loved him. But not now. No, not yet. Biting her lip, she gripped her hands together, staring down at her lap. The plane ride to Las Vegas would last two hours. There was no need to blurt out her personal feelings in earshot of the chauffeur and bodyguard in the front seat!

Especially since she was already a little scared to do so.

She looked out at the passing scenery and gave a sudden start. Leaning forward, she touched the chauffeur's shoulder timidly. "Excuse me, but you've made a mistake. We're not even close to the city."

"He hasn't made a mistake," Robin said.

She sat back in her seat. "He hasn't?"

"We're not going to the airport."

"We're not?"

He turned to look at her. His eyes were not readable. "Do you remember I told you about the medical clinic? The best brain trauma clinic in the country?"

She stared at him. "We're going to the clinic? Not Las Vegas?"

He nodded.

"You got Marian back," she whispered.

He looked away, "Yes."

Staring at him, a slow feeling of joy rose inside her as she realized what it had to mean.

Robin wasn't going to trade her after all. He'd realized he cared about Regina more than his iron clad promises. He must have gone back on his vow never to pay off Leopold, and offered the man a fortune in trade for Marian instead of Marian. It was the only solution that made sense.

Robin had chosen Regina. He'd decided she was more important to him than his promise.

But as she looked at him, the smile slid from her face. Was that why Robin didn't look particularly happy? Because for the first time in his life, he'd broken his word?

The SUV passed a thicket of juniper trees and drove past a gate into the parking lot of a small modern hospital. The building was blocky and sterile, but even in the cold rain of late February, Regina had never seen such beautiful.

Robin had chosen her. Over his promises. Over honor. Over his code. It was all she could do not to wrap her arms around herself and sing a happy song. And suddenly she was so filled with love for him that she was no longer cared who heard her.

As the car stopped in front of the hospital, she turned to Robin in the backseat.

"I love you," she blurted out.

His blue eyes widened. She heard his intake of breath, "Regina-"

She covered his mouth with her hand. "If I don't tell you now, I might never have the courage. I love you, Robin. I love you and I'll never forget that today you chose me over..."

Her voice trailed off as she saw a red Ferrari roar past their SUV, followed by a van. The vehicles parked in front of them on the curb. A man got out of the Ferrari, and Regina's eyes widened. Her hand fell numbly into her lap.

"Leopold?" Shocked, she turned to Robin, her eyes begging for an explanation she could bear. "What is Leopold doing here?"

The driver and chauffeur got out of the SUV, closing the doors solidly behind them, and they were alone. Robin's face was almost expressionless as he faced her.

"He's here for the trade."

Regina stared at him. "The...trade?"

She turned back to see Leopold open the back doors of the van parked in front of them. Inside, Regina saw a slender, dark haired woman sleeping on a stretcher. Leopold saw Robin, jabbing his thumb toward the unconscious woman, then waited with a sour expression, his hands on his hips.

Then he saw Regina and gave her a sickeningly sweet smile.

Twisting her head away, Regina closed her eyes with a whimper. "You can't trade me. You can't."

"I have no choice."

His cold words went through her soul like a blow.

She'd been a fool to think he'd changed, or that he cared about her. His honor meant more to him than Regina ever could. Her heart fell to her shoes with a dull thud. Blinking fast, she said. "There must be some other way-"

"There is not," he said. "I've tried. Tried and failed. Everywhere I looked for her, I arrived too late. I have no choice but to trade." His eyes glittered as he looked up at her. "But what happens next is up to you."

She stared at him in sudden shock.

"Those weren't business trips at all, were they?" she breathed. "The honeymoon cottage in the Maldives. The villa. I thought they were romantic trips we took for your work, but the whole time you were searching for Marian behind my back!"

He gave a single jerky nod.

Tears filled her eyes. "You're no better than Leopold," she whispered. "Romancing one woman while committed to another."

"That's not how it was."

She saw the pain in Robin's eyes, but she was too hurt to hold back any longer. "Who is Marian to you, Robin," she said. "Why do you love her? Who is she to you?"

"I can't tell you."

"Because you made a promise."

"Yes."

"And my feelings mean nothing."

"That's not true." He took a deep breath. "But I must fulfill my obligation."

"So that's all I am to you? An obligation?"

"Regina, no," he said. "I.." He looked at her. "I...care for you. Very much."

"You care for me," she said bitterly. "Thank you. I've just told you I'm in love with you!"

He blinked slowly, then pushed an envelope into her numb hands. "I'm giving you the choice," he said. "I've held you captive, seduced you. Now you have the power. I'm setting you free to decide."

"By trading me?" Tears were brimming over her lashes as she crumpled the envelope in her fist. She would not cry in front of him, could not! "By discarding me, pushing me into another man's arms?"

"No!" he said fiercely. He put his larger hand over hers. "I know you'll never love him. But...it must be your choice."

The ice reality slowly sank into Regina's heart. Robin was really letting her go. He was trading her for the woman he truly loved. And he wouldn't even offer Regina the small comfort of an explanation.

Agony and fury ripped her heart into shreds. She wrenched her hand from his grasp.

"You love promises so much? All right. Here's one for you." She lifted her chin, her chin wet with unshed tears. "Never come looking for me, Robin. I never want to see you again!"

He sucked in his breath, "You don't mean that."

"Yes, I do. I'll go through with this, this trade." Her lip twisted. "But I want your word I'll never see you again."

"No!" He put his hands on her shoulders, searching her eyes with his own. "Don't you understand?" he said in a low voice. "If I make you a promise, I can't break it."

"I understand that. Better than anyone." She shook his hands off her shoulders and spoke in an icy voice that revealed nothing of her heartbreak. "That's why I want to hear you speak the words."

"I don't want to do it!"

"As you said," she gave him a hard, cold stare. "it's not your choice."

He took a deep breath, closing his eyes. "Fine." The words were low, as if ripped from his soul. "If that is truly what you wish. I will not come after you. I will not try to see you again."

"Promise!"

"I give you my word." He swallowed. When he opened his eyes, their blue orbs, fathomless pain registered dimly through her numb heart. "But in return," he choked out, "you must promise me you will read that letter."

"Fine." She wrenched away from him, pushing open the car door before he could see her cry.

He'd actually done it. He'd made the promise. Some part of her hoped, at the last moment, that he would refuse to make it, that he would tell her he loved her and only her.

Her mistake.

Stumbling out of the SUV, she tripped toward the curb, where Leopold was waiting for her beside his gleaming sports car. He looked down at her, beaming.

"Darling," he said, "At last, you are back with me."

"I will be a better man from now on. Everything is going to be different now, petal. I swear to you. I will do whatever you say, anything to make you happy, anything at all..."

Regina stared out wearily at the passing scenery as they approached the easter edge of San Francisco. For the last hour, Leopold had been prattling on about forgiveness and love. She didn't think he knew what the hell he was talking about.

But then, neither did she, Regina thought bitterly. She thought of the stark, anguished look on Robin's face when he'd said, "I will not try to see you again," and it was all she could do to keep from crying.

So maybe she did finally know what love was after all.

 _Pain._

She blinked quickly, staring out at the rain as they zoomed west on the highway.

She thought of a quote she liked _, A Queen will always turn pain into power._

"I want to go home," she whispered.

"Absolutely," Leopold said, clearly thrilled to get any response from her. "Straight home to your mother. Then we'll have the wedding you always wanted. As soon as possible. Is tomorrow too soon?"

That statement was so shocking that she turned to gape at him. "You can't honestly think I'm going to marry you."

"I know this whole experience has been very upsetting for you, petal, forced to endure the captivity of that depraved beast..."

Depraved beast? She had a sudden memory of Robin's haunted expression as Leopold had driven by him in the Ferrari, with Regina beside him. Her eyes had met Robin's in the endless gray rain. Then Leopold had stomped on the gas pedal, and they'd left him behind.

Robin was lost to her now. Forever.

"But we must put that all unpleasantness behind us now," Leopold finished firmly.

With an intake of breath, she whirled back to face him.

"What was unpleasant was finding out you were already married," she said, "to find out that you were waiting for your real wife to die so you could steal her money."

Silence fell in the Ferrari.

"I did that because I loved you. I needed money for you," Leopold said in a determinedly cheerful voice. "But petal, we must move on now with our lives." He gave her a toothy grin. "Marry me tonight. Let me start making it up to you."

She had a sudden memory of raspberries in champagne, bubble bath, inscrutable blue eyes filled with tenderness and fire.

 _"What are you doing?"_

 _"Making it up to you," Robin had said._

Robin had already given her, her wedding night.

Catching herself, she looked at Leopold beside her. "We're not getting married. Not tonight. Not ever."

"But I did it all out of love for you," he pleaded. "I gave up the money for you. All I have now is this car and a castle. I gave up everything for you!"

"And you think that makes me obligated to marry you? Because you allowed Robin to get her some decent medical care, when you were waiting eagerly for her to die of your neglect?" Regina fired at him.

He reached one hand from the steering wheel and tried to take her hand, "You're just angry," he pleaded. "After our wedding..."

"What will it take for you to ever actually listen to me?" she shouted. "I am not going to marry you. Ever! Pull off the highway. I'll take a taxi home!"

He withdrew his hand. His face was grim as he pulled off the highway. But instead of stopping, he turned the car around to drive the opposite direction on the highway, now heading to the east.

"Do you really think I'll let you go?" he said in a low voice. "I gave up Marian's fortune. You owe me."

"What?" Regina choked out a laugh. "You mean the fifty dollars in my bank account? You can have it."

"I mean the money Locksley gave you," he said coldly. "Millions of dollars and that old factory in the bargain. Once the building is demolished, the land might fetch a good price," he mused.

"What are you talking about?"

"Funny isn't it? Locksley called me last night. He'd always said he'd never give me a penny. But this time, he offered instead to give money to you. _What happens next is up to Regina_ , he said. "Oh, did Locksley not tell you? He's just made you a very rich woman."

Regina suddenly thought of her envelope he'd given her, still clenched in her hand. Her hands trembled as she started to open it.

Leopold ripped it out of her hands and tossed it out his window.

"Why did you do that?" she gasped.

"You don't need it."

"What?"

"Forget him, Regina."

"Stop this car!"

"Locksley is a nameless bastard. A nobody. He's brainwashed you, turned you against me," he said resentfully. "Just as he did that sister of his."

Her mouth fell open. "Marian is his sister?"

Leopold shrugged. "He kept it quiet. Promised her he wouldn't start a scandal."

"You're a monster!"

"Now, is that anything to say to the man you love?"

"I don't love you!"

"You will love me, petal," he said, still smiling. He reached out to stroke her cheek. "I promise you that."

When she jerked her head away, Leopold looked at her resentfully. "It disgusts me how you let him touch you."

Turning away, she didn't answer. He stared at her, then stomped harder on the gas pedal. As the car went faster and faster down the highway, she gripped her seat belt in fear.

 _Robin,_ she thought, closing her eyes. _Please come for me._

Then she remembered the promise she'd forced on him and nearly wept. Perhaps he'd have immediately forgotten Regina from the instant he had his sick sister back, desperately needing his care. But the promise Regina had forced him to give her had been the nail in the coffin. Robin now couldn't come save her, even if he'd wanted to. She'd made sure of that. And now it would destroy her.

Turning to fave, Leopold, she choked out, "Where are you taking me?"

"A private cabin where we can be alone. For days. Weeks, if necessary," Leopold gave her a sly smile that made her shudder as he purred. "I'll make you remember your love for me. I'll enjoy your body. And when I've cleansed you of that English bastard's memory, you will give me everything and marry me."


	12. Chapter 12

**(A/N-Special thanks to Bekki boo for beta reading this. Also to those who read, review, follow and fav.)**

* * *

"We're still running tests, Mr. Locksley, but we're optimistic."

Robin sagged in relief against the white concrete wall of the medical clinic. "Thank God."

"We'll keep you updated." The doctor looked at him with concern. "But you should get some rest, before we have to check you in as well."

"I'm fine."

The doctor clapped him on the shoulder encouragingly. "Don't worry. She's young and strong. Her chances are excellent for a full recovery."

After he'd left, Robin closed his eyes, feeling the fresh drizzle of rain on his face. His cousin was safe. Marian was now receiving the best medical care possible. For the first time in a year, he did not have that driving fear inside him, the fear that he might fail her, the fear that she might die after he'd promised to always look out for her. His aunt had told him before she had died that he had a half sister, his father had only found out about her weeks before his death. The woman who had given birth to her, had been an ex girlfriend of his father's and had never told him that she was pregnant and had given the baby up for adoption.

He should have been overcome with relief and joy. And yet he found himself still hunched over with grief. He looked up to see a brunette woman coming out of the mist in the parking lot.

"Regina," he whispered, his heart in his throat. Had she read the letter? Had she changed her mind?

Then she saw her embrace another man, a male nurse who'd just come out of the clinic. Looking at her more closely, Robin realized the woman looked nothing like Regina. His vision was playing tricks on him.

She'd told him she loved him. And for his answer, he'd traded her. He'd given her into Blanchard's hands.

Had she read the letter yet? Would she keep her promise?

His hands clenched into fists as he rubbed his stinging eyes. All he wanted was to have Regina in his arms, to share his joy about his cousin's prognosis. For Christ's sake, to even tell her that Marian was his cousin!

Instead, he's made a promise he never wanted to keep. He was powerless to pursue her. And now he was a prisoner of his own word.

Maybe it was for the best, he told himself wearily. God knew Regina deserved better than a man like him. She deserved a husband with an open, loving heart, an equal partner who would share everything with her, not a closed off, vengeful man with a scarred heart like Robin's.

 _But I can change_ , his heart cried. _I already have changed, because of her._

All he wanted was for her to be happy. And the last time he'd seen her, her face had been so wan and pale, her eyes so sad, as she driven past him in the Ferrari with Blanchard at her side. Leopold had looked smug and satisfied.

And something more.

Robin blinked. What had been in the man's eyes? He'd been too distracted by worry and grief to pay much attention to Blanchard at the time, but now there'd been something in the man's expression. He'd dismissed Leopold as a weakling. But even a weakling could be vicious when cornered.

Trying to tell himself he had nothing to worry about, Robin reached for his cell phone. His hands shook as he dialed the number of her mother's house an hour to the south.

But when Cora answered on the third ring, she sounded surprised by his question. "Regina? No, we haven't seen her. No, she hasn't called. Why? What's wrong? We thought she was with you!"

"I'll explain later," Robin replied, but when he hung up his whole body was cold with sweat.

Regina would not have willingly run off with Leopold. She detested the man's lack of morals, his selfish cruelty. She would have wanted to go straight home to her family. She wouldn't have detoured for a cozy chat with Leopold, at least not willingly.

Robin raked his hair back with his hand. How could he have been so arrogant as to assume that Leopold was no threat, and he would meekly accept Regina's refusal? How could he have believed the man would relinquish her, and her new fortune, without a fight?

The man's weakness, his cowardice were exactly what made him dangerous. And now Robin could do nothing to save her. Sucking in his breath, he punched the concrete wall of the clinic, causing little pieces of rock to crumble and scatter. Blood oozed from his knuckles as he covered his face with his hands. He was helpless to find the woman he loved.

Or wasn't he?

Slowly, he lowered his hands.

All his life, he'd considered his promise to be his worth as a man. But in this moment, he realized that there was something even more sacred than a man's word.

His love.

It was honor beyond any promise; a man had to protect those that he loved.

He had to keep Regina safe.

Opening his cell phone, he dialed his chief bodyguard, his top private investigator, his connections in San Francisco, even the sheriff in Regina's hometown. No car accidents had been reported. As he waited for news, Robin paced back and forth in the parking lot of the medical clinic. He no longer felt the cold drizzle of the rain against his face. His muscles ached to jump into his car and drive to find her, but where? Which direction should he go?

Leopold wouldn't take her to a motel. He wouldn't take her anywhere she might be seen. And he no longer had the money to charter a plane, unless he married Regina. Robin had thought it was such a tidy way to get revenge on Leopold, to use the man's arrogance and greed against him, to get Marian to safety while allowing Regina to make her own choice about her life. He raked his hair back again. He'd been a fool!

The phone rang in his hands and he answered it on the first ring, "Yes?"

"A red Ferrari was seen on the I-50, heading east," the investigator told him. "No license plate information, but a car like that stands out."

Heading east? Why east? There was nothing in that direction, nothing but the wild mountains and eventually Lake Tahoe, which in February would still be thick with snow and frozen rain. When would anyone be insane enough to drive a low slung race car in that direction? Where was the man going?

 _Then Robin knew._

Closing his phone with an intake of breath, he ran for his SUV.

"Get in there!"

Cursing, Leopold shoved her into the old cabin before he slammed the door behind them. Regina backed away, still glaring at him, rubbing her half frozen wrists that he'd bruised with his grip.

They'd had to walk most of the way up to the cabin in the freezing rain. Her feet were like ice, and she'd almost forgotten what it was like to be warm. She didn't know if she'd ever feel warm again.

But still, when Regina had seen the cabin in the clearing, she'd tried to run away. She'd turned blindly back towards the woods to take her chances in the frozen mountains. But Leopold had had other ideas. He was now blocking the door behind him.

"What is this place?" Regina asked.

"A cabin Marian's father had once," Leopold answered, "Locksley came here last year. He nearly found Marian. I barely had time to pull her into the woods with the nurse to hide. After he left, I started leaving false trails around the world, hiring look-alikes to distract him."

She thought of all the anguished energy that Robin had spent trying to find her. "How can you be so cruel?"

He shrugged, "It was easier to keep him on a hopeless wild goose chase. I thought the car accident was fate finally rewarding me as I deserved. I never thought she would live for a whole year."

Regina stared at him, her eyes wide, her hand covering her mouth, "You're truly a monster. You tried to kill your own wife!"

"She should have died. I deserve her money more than she ever did. She married me. I earned it." He looked at her. "Just as I deserve you."

With an intake of breath at the hard hunger in his eyes, Regina took a step back.

Leopold must have seen the fear in her expression, because he turned back to the fireplace in a posture of confidence. Leaning forward to open the fire, he placed a single log inside and lit a match. He pressed the flame up against the wood.

Without any tinder, the log wouldn't light. As Regina watched, he lit four matches all to the same result, and with every failure his anger grew. Finally with a curse, he blew out the fifth match and tossed it to the floor. He glared at Regina.

His scowl changed to a sensual, threatening smile.

"I'll start the fire later," he purred. "In the meantime, I'll just have to warm myself with you."

He lunged toward her. With a yelp, she tried to run away, but he was too fast for her. Grabbing her, he pushed her against the kitchen table. She fought him with a scream. When she bit the hand he placed over her mouth, he roughly turned her over on her belly.

"This will only hurt at first," he said, panting. "Then you will realize you love it."

"No!" she screamed, thrashing.

"Stop fighting!" he yelled. Brutally, he grabbed her by her hair then banged her head against the hard wooden table. She went limp, dazed as she saw stars.

"Once you're pregnant with my child," he panted. "you will accept me as your husband." Unzipping his fly, he started to lift her dress. "You will-"

His voice ended with a choke as he dropped her.

Weakly, Regina turned around against the table and she saw a miracle, Robin had him by the throat.

"You like to hurt women you claim to love," Robin said in cold, deadly fury. "You deserve to die."

"No, please," Leopold cried.

Mercilessly, Robin punched him in the face, knocking him to the rough wooden floor. Leopold dropped like a stone.

"Robin," Regina whimpered.

With an intake of breath, Robin went to her, gathering her up tenderly in his arms.

"Regina," he breathed, holding her. "Did he hurt you? My God, tell me I was in time!"

"He didn't hurt me. You came," she whispered, touching his face in wonder. "Robin, somehow you came."

"Regina, I have to tell you something. I..."

Leopold got up behind them, then with a last shouted curse he stumbled for the door. Flinging it open, he ran out of the cabin, heading for the snowy forest.

Robin started to chase him, but Regina grabbed his hand.

"No, please," she whispered. Her cold fingers curled around his. "Please stay with me."

"Yes." He instantly turned back to her. The woman he loved needed him, that trumped his need to go after that bastard. "You're so cold," he murmured in a worried voice. He pulled her against his chest, wrapping his coat around her. "I have to get you warm."

Regina looked at him. Cold? She wasn't cold any longer. Dawning joy was slowly thawing her heart from within. "You broke your promise," she said in shock. "You came for me."

"I came." He drew back, looking down at her with troubled dark eyes. "Forgive me."

"Forgive you?" She laughed even as tears streaked down her face. "For saving my life? All right. Just this time, I will."

But his eyes were serious. "I always prided myself on keeping my word above all else. But today I realized honor means nothing without love. Without you."

Robin gently stroked her face, tilting her chin upward.

"I love you, Regina," he said in a low voice, searching her eyes intently. "Tell me it's not too late. Tell me I have a second chance to win you back. I love you. I love you so much."

Her heart ached at the word she'd waited a lifetime to hear, from a man she'd waited a lifetime to find. The strong, honorable, man she could love for the rest of her life.

Reaching her hand up against his rough cheek, she felt warmth and joy overwhelming her heart. "I never stopped loving you," she whispered. "I will love you forever."

"I guess I have a new title," Robin said as Regina looked at his with a question in her eyes. "A thief, who stole something from you. Your heart."

"You can't steal something that's been given to you," Regina said.

Looking down at her, his blue eyes were suspiciously wet. "Marry me, Regina."

In answer, she nodded as tears of happiness streaked her face.

He sucked in his breath. As he lowered his mouth to hers, he whispered. "You are my family. My wife. My love. You...you are my promise."

* * *

In the not to distant future...

"Henry! Roland! I need you to set the table!" Regina called out to her two sons.

"Ah, Mom. Can't Hope do it?" Henry asked.

"Hope set the table last time," Regina reminded them.

"Come on, Roland, let's go set the table so we can eat some of Mom's lasagna," Henry said as the two boys ran off.

"Wait! Where's your sister?" Regina called out as they headed towards the kitchen.

"She was heading up into the attic, something about looking for Papa's bow and arrow," Roland called back to his mother.

Regina headed upstairs to check on her little girl, she shook her head as she thought of how like her father she was. While most girls her age were playing with dolls, Hope took after her father and was a tomboy in every sense of the word.

She saw that the attic door was open and she made her way upstairs, "Hope?"

"Over here, Mommy," Hope said as Regina saw her daughter holding a satchel.

"What are you doing up here? Your father will be home soon," Regina said as Hope walked over to her mother, and Regina picked her up, settling her on her hip

"I was exploring," Hope said.

"Oh you were," Regina said as Hope smiled, and those famous Locksley dimples were exposed as clear as day. Hope continued to look at her, and Regina asked, "Why are you staring, Hope?"

"I look just like you when you were little," Hope said.

"Why, yes you do," Regina said, thinking Hope must have come across some old photos of her when she was little to look at.

"The drawing is really good," Hope said.

"What drawing?" Regina asked.

"The one in Daddy's satchel," Hope answered.

"Show me," Regina said, thinking that Robin must have drawn Hope and not her instead. Regina sat Hope down, and watched as her little girl went to Robin's satchel and opened it to pull out a piece of paper.

"Here, Mommy," Hope said as she held the piece of paper in her hand.

Regina took it from her daughter and looked at it. It did indeed look like her when she was little. But it couldn't be, this had to be Hope instead. She was about to inform Hope that it was her that her father had drawn and not herself when she was little.

"It can't be," Regina muttered as she saw the date on the February 1, 1990, signed by R. Locksley.

"What is it, Mommy?" Hope asked.

"Regina?" Robin's voice called from behind her.

"Daddy!" Hope yelled as she ran to her father, who went to his knees and picked her up in his arms.

"And what are my two favorite women doing upstairs?" Robin asked as he walked closer to Regina, Hope still in his arms.

"I was showing Mommy your drawing," Hope said.

"Robin? How...how did you draw this picture of me when I was little?" Regina asked as she showed him the drawing. "I never met you when I was little."

"I have forgotten about this drawing," Robin said, "I was twelve and my father had just died that year, we had almost lost everything. I was so desperate that I took my drawing pad and pencils and went to the streets of London to try to earn any money that I could. I had just about given up totally, when this little girl walked out of a toy store and gave me a twenty dollar coin."

"Why did she do that, Daddy?" Hope asked.

"I asked her the same thing, Hope. I asked her if she wanted me to draw her picture, and she told me, no, that she didn't," Robin said.

"Why not, Daddy?" Hope asked.

"You see, Hope, she told me it was-"

"Her birthday," Regina finished for him.

Robin looked at Regina in shock, "How did you know it was her birthday?"

"Because, that little girl was me," Regina answered, "Look at it, Robin. It looks just like Hope."

Robin looked at the old drawing, one he hadn't looked at since he was little. It did look just like Hope. Regina was that little girl, who had given him that coin.

"It was you!" Robin said as he couldn't believe how fate had put them together as children, only to throw them again later in their lives. "I wanted to thank you so much, you can't imagine what your deed that day inspired me. I think I have something that belongs to you, if you'll take Hope for a second."

Regina took her daughter from Robin, while he dug more into his old satchel. He pulled out a small bad, which held two very important items. He opened it up, and pulled out the first item.

"Remember this?" Robin asked as he held the precious gold coin in his fingers.

"You kept it? Why didn't you use it?" Regina asked.

"I was going to, I ran home to tell my mother, when my Aunt Lillian was at the shelter and she was taking my mother and me to her house in the country," Robin answered. "So I never used the coin. We were able to live at her home and I worked hard and swore to myself to make sure I was never put into that situation ever again."

"I can't believe that coin still exists," Regina said, "My father gave it to me, told me to spend it however I wanted to."

"And you gave it to a lonely little boy," Robin said.

"What else is in the bag, Daddy?" Hope asked, causing the other two adults to chuckle at their daughter's impatience.

"Well, this item is very precious as well," Robin said as he started to bring out the other item, "this is something that your Mommy lost that day."

Regina gasped as Robin held the little red ribbon that her dear father had put in her hair that long ago day on her birthday. "My ribbon!" Regina grabbed it, and held it carefully as she closed her eyes and could picture in her head her father, tying it in her hair.

"Daddy, why is Mommy crying?" Hope asked.

"Because, she is very happy right now, Hope," Robin answered.

"So you cry when you're happy, Daddy?" Hope asked, clearly confused.

"In some cases, yes. I've seen your Mommy cry when she was happy like this before," Robin said as he leaned over and wiped a tear from Regina's cheek.

"When?" Hope asked as she mimicked her father and wiped a tear from her mother's other cheek.

"Well, when we I proposed to your mother, when I married your mother. And of course, when we brought your brother Henry home for good. Also when your brother Roland was born, and of course when you were born, Hope," Robin answered.

"So she's very happy now?" Hope asked.

"Yes, I am, Hope," Regina spoke up as she kissed her daughter's forehead.

Hope looked over at her father and he winked at her, "I told you." He whispered as he walked up and put his arms around the two most important women in his life, his wife and their daughter.

"Mom! Dad!" Henry called from downstairs.

"We better go," Regina said as she put Hope down.

"Hope, why don't you go see how your brothers are doing?" Robin asked.

"Okay, Daddy," Hope said who headed downstairs to see about her brothers.

"It was you, really you," Regina said as she went into her husband's arms.

"And you," Robin said.

"I guessed this means that we were meant to be," Regina said.

"We didn't meet by accident, we were meant to cross paths for a reason," Robin said.

"Soul mates," Regina said.

"What's a soul mate?" Hope said as Robin and Regina turned to see their daughter in the doorway of the attic.

"I thought you were downstairs, Hope," Robin said.

"They are still setting the table," Hope said as she asked again, "What's a soul mate, Daddy?"

"Well, it's like a best friend, but more. It's the one person in the world that knows you better than anyone else. It's someone who makes you a better person. Actually, they don't make you a better person, you do that yourself because they inspire you. A soul mate is someone who you carry with you forever. It's the one person who knew you and accepted you and believed in you before anyone else did or when no one else would. And no matter what happens, you'll always love her. Nothing can ever change that. Make sense?" Robin asked.

"I think so," Hope said.

"Good, now let's go downstairs and get some dinner," Robin said as they all headed downstairs for dinner. The food was delicious and the children watched a movie, when eight o'clock came around it was time for Hope's bath and bed time. Once Robin had finished giving her a bath, he then put her in some pajamas, just like her mother's silky grey ones.

"I love you, Hope," Robin said as he kissed her forehead.

"I love you too, Daddy," Hope said. "Daddy?"

"Yes, princess?" Robin asked.

"Can I have that coin that Mommy gave you?" Hope asked.

"Why would you want it, princess?" Robin asked, thinking maybe she wanted to buy something.

"Because, I want to find my soul mate like you found, Mommy," Hope said.

Robin chuckled and put her stuffed animal beside her, "When you're older, perhaps."

"How old, Daddy?" Hope asked.

"Thirty, at least," Robin answered.

After he left his daughter's room, he checked on the boys who were both asleep in their bunk beds. He then made sure all the doors were locked and headed to the main bedroom, Regina was lying on her side. He quickly undressed down to his boxers and slid quietly into bed behind her. He put his arms around her form, and lightly kissed the side of her face exposed.

"Thirty?" Regina asked as she smiled.

"Maybe, forty," Robin answered, he chuckled as he pulled her close into his arms.

"You're horrible, you know that," Regina said, jokingly.

"I can't help that I dread the day, my little girl has her first crush, date, heartbreak," Robin said.

"Well, you can look at it this way then," Regina said, "You might only have to go through those stages twice."

"Why twice?" Robin asked.

"Because if this," Regina took Robin's hand in hers and placed it low on her belly, "is a little girl, then you'll be an expert by then, hopefully."

"Regina? You're pregnant?" Robin asked.

"Indeed," Regina said one of Robin's favorite words to use.

"When?" Robin asked, wanting to know when their next child would be born.

"That weekend we flew to Vancouver, eight weeks ago," Regina said.

Robin smiled as he was reminded of that weekend they had gotten away, "So seven months from now."

"Yes, and if it's a little girl, I'm going to take a small piece of the red ribbon and put it in her hair," Regina said.

"You'll need to make one for Hope as well," Robin said as he thought of what a fortunate man he truly was, he had two young sons, a beautiful little girl who had stolen his heart the moment he held her. And he had a stunning wife, who loved him more than anything. One, he had met when they were both children, crossing each other's lives, her coming into his when he had almost given up all hope.

"I wouldn't dream of not doing it," Regina said as Robin kissed her and together the Locksleys all drifted off to sleep, all SIX of them.

 _ **THE END.**_


End file.
